Category: Finished Series: Action

Rinne no Lagrange – 09

by psgels, posted in Rinne no Lagrange

And yet again this show is building up. Thankfully the creators did give a reason for it: everyone is pretty much waiting for back-up to arrive. So yeah, in the meantime nothing much is gonna happen. It’s a stark contras with Aquarion, which figures out a big battle in every episode. If this show can pull it off in the end, it will be the better approach, because it can put more focus on the individual battles, rather than them turning into some sort of unity sausage (is that a proverb in English as well? I’m not sure…).

The big pitfall of this approach is that the series isn’t going to pick up enough momentum. In the end, what really happened in this episode? Some of the villains wandered around and met a bunch of people. The direction and timing made for some funny moments and Madoka’s past was nice, but it’s still missing something. If this was just one episode I wouldn’t be worried, but this has been going on for quite a few weeks now. Still, this is a Tatsuo Sato series. In the end, this series too puts emphasis on letting characters play out, it just does this a bit later than Mouretsu Pirates. Because of that, Mouretsu had a dull beginning, while it’s getting really interesting now, whereas Rinne no Lagrange’s start was excellent, only for it to catch up on the build-up right now in order to prevent the characters from turning into underdeveloped stereotypes.
Rating: * (Good)

Aquarion Evol – 09

by psgels, posted in Aquarion Evol

With this, Mix and Andy (Andy W. Hole; seriously?) have gotten their episode as well. Because yes, this series has decided that the two of them are going to be a couple. We already knew that Andy’s power was to create holes. Now, it turns out that Mix’s power is to fill them. Truly a match made in heavens.

In any case, this episode was as fun as the rest of the show. The romantic tensions between Mix and Andy in particular were just hilarious. All of the bizarrely epic ways which the creators found to symbolize holes were also hilarious. Yes, of course donuts are like the galaxy we live in. Makes perfect sense!And why is that headmaster still upholding the “no romance”-rule?

In any case, the series progression has been pretty solid so far. The cast here is fairly large, so it’s only natural that we get a string of episodes about the different cast. There are only a few left: that fangirl still needs one, Mikono’s brother is still left and the nun will also probably get one. It’s basic build-up, but it’s tried and true for a reason: it works and this this makes sure to create an engaging cast. The most important thing right now is that while it’s doing this build-up, it’s really fun to watch.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Rinne no Lagrange – 08

by psgels, posted in Rinne no Lagrange

A building up episode, which was used to expand a bit upon the background of this series (ad it’s good to have a bit more information on what the Vox actually are), and to introduce the probably final major character of this series: the boss of the whole organization returns. So obviously she’s a a young-looking blond girl.

At the very least she’s proactive and gets things done, but we’ll see what the creators have in store for her and for that bizarre cross-dressing maid for the rest of this series. What also was a major point in this series is that Madoka isn’t going to be a pilot anymore. Now, that’s the kind of twist that really has me wonder why the creators pulled it. It’s not really going to make a point if Madoka just ends up ignoring all this, piloting her Vox anyway.

Overall, the direction that made me praise the first episodes of this shows has weakened a bit for the past few weeks. There were still some points where this episode was rather sharp, like with the maid, or the point where Madoka agreed to not pilot anymore (hence my worries for the next battle), but I don’t know… it lacks that energy that made it so addictive. Is this just a matter of building up (this is a Tatsuo Sato series, after all), or is this Xebec being lazy?
Rating: * (Good)

Aquarion Evol – 08

by psgels, posted in Aquarion Evol

Wtf, Aquarion. Just… wtf.

I feel a bit silly for complaining about the fanservice in Rinne no Lagrange, although my point still stands there: the fanservice there was blatant, overdone and cheap. Here however…. it was used to push the sexual content of this show to the absurd. When I first started to blog this, the males versus females themes were the parts that caught my interest. I didn’t expect Shoji Kawamori and Mari Okada to carry it this far, though.

“Your senses grow sharper as you grow more naked”? Who the hell came up with that? Still, I loved how much tension there was between the sexes in this episode. It’s not just one-sided female fanservice, the males also got pushed into the defensive here; I especially loved it when Amano started stripping for once.

The thing is that usually, I’m really not a fan of series with so much romantic context. I remember immediately dropping Infinite Stratos when it aired a year ago (which by the way also was an 8-Bit series), but that’s because most of them are just so dull and lifeless, with so little ambition. This time though, the plot has just gotten crazy. The combination of Mari Okada and Shoji Kawamori dug up a whole new area of campness in both of them.

But what the hell are they doing next season with that AKB0048 show?
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Rinne no Lagrange – 07

by psgels, posted in Rinne no Lagrange

Eh. This remains Xebec, unfortunately. I’m glad that next season they will end up animating something as manly as Yamato (it had better not be just a recap!). This episode brought back the shameless fanservice unfortunately, and overall only was interesting because of how it completed the bonding between the three main characters, something we knew was about to happen.

With those boob groping scenes, I just can’t help but think back to that parody that B Gata H Kei had in it once, where they showed what the male version of that would be like. Yeah. I would know this, but do females really randomly get naked and grope each other when there are no males around? And okay, if the fanservice was creative I would not have minded. But this was the same stuff we see everywhere.

In any case, there sure are a lot of building up episodes this week, which doesn’t make it the most interesting in terms of anime. The trick with building up is to remain interesting, and Muginami’s backstory just wasn’t interesting enough for that, unfortunately.
Rating: – (Disappointing)

Full Metal Alchemist – Brotherhood – The Sacred Star of Milos Review – 82.5/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews, Full Metal Alchemist - Brotherhood

Out of the entire FMA franchise, the worst part for me was the movie to the first season. It just mad eno sense, was badly animated, especially for movie standards, mad a mockery of the characters and the plot, and overall wasn’t the least bit enjoyable. Thankfully, The Sacred Star of Milos is nothing like that, and is actually a pretty good movie.

Let me first debunk some overall fears that arose with the announcement of this movie: do you remember how in the promo art, Winri looked really inaccurate to her designs in the other series? Well, that is because that wasn’t Winry at all. She’s a character original to this movie, and pretty much the main character. I know a few people who were turned off by the art style of it (yeah), but let me tell you that that is no reason to skip this movie. One thing that you do need to take into account that this IS made by different people as the anime staff, so the animation IS different from the style of the TV-series. The character designs in this movie are a bit more rough and simple. This movie also doesn’t really bother to keep its faces consistent. As a tradeoff however, ti did get a lot of very good inbetween animation. It’s been said before, but this movie has some very good action, and especially the choreography of the different action scenes is very good and creative.

So, what about the story? As it turns out, this takes place around the second half of the Brotherhood TV-series. It’s an original story that doesn’t have anything to do with the main storyline of the series, but it does flesh out the world the world it’s set in. As for the plot: it has some good and bad parts. The good parts was that it packed a good amount of twists that were well built up throughout its airtime. It created a new city in the FMA universe, and actually successfully populated it and created an epic storyline around it. Although… near the end it does get a little too epic.

What I mean by that is the following: you can really see that the creators put some good thought into some of the twists that are pulled. Near the end of the movie however, they just run out of time and momentum to keep that up, resulting in a rushed ending and a final villain with very flimsy motives who continues to spout random moral crap at the main characters. The themes and morals also are a part where this movie leaves things to be desired. Like the TV-series, it’s full of morals, and it doesn’t just copy them, but also adds in its own themes. At the end of the movie though, it didn’t really do anything with them, and most of the final quarter was just completely inconsistent with the morals it tried to build up, and not in a way that makes things come together.

So yeah, it’s a very nice movie, which unfortunately suffers of the common flaw of trying to do too much and trying to be too epic. Still, I’d recommend it. It’s a solid movie with likable characters, and I’d say that out of the Primetime Timeslot movies to come out in the recent years, it is so far the most solid and enjoyable.

Storytelling: 8/10 – Solid storyline for a movie that is just about a random story, albeit a bit too short to give everything the time it needs to build up.
Characters: 8/10 – A solid cast, both the old and new characters. The main villain is flimsy, though.
Production-Values: 9/10 – Great action choreography.
Setting: 8/10 – Doesn’t build much on the themes of the TV-series, but does flesh out the world it plays in.

Suggestions:
– Cowboy Bebop – Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door
– Heartcatch Precure Movie
– Metropolis

Aquarion Evol – 07

by psgels, posted in Aquarion Evol

Okay, with Shoji Kawamori it was inevitable, especially in a serise with so much sexual subtext, but it’s still annoying to see “the pointless love triangle”, as I’d like to call it. This is where there’s an overly obvious main couple, and yet the creators still try to bring in a love rival for the male lead for some artificial tensions. That guy with Mikono is excused because he’s important to the plot. But Zessica… just give her her own love interest. There’s no reason for her to be just part of Amato’s harem.

More criticism arise when you start to compare this series to series as Rinne no Lagrange. I’m especially pointing to how this show uses its setting: in rinne no lagrange, everyone is fully aware of where they’re fighting, and Madoka tries to keep the damages to her surroundings as small as possible for that. In this show, the characters just randomly destroy buildings and roads, which completely disappear again afterwards. Really, who found it a good idea to have these robots duke out in the middle of a city? I mean, I can understand it if the city was the target of these robots (why, though?)
, but with all the fancy technology, they didn’t even have a proper radar to intercept these giant robots or something, allowing them to fight in a place that isn’t as costly to rebuild?

Criticism 3: why the sexual context also involving the little girl?
Rating: (Enjoyable)

Rinne no Lagrange – 06

by psgels, posted in Rinne no Lagrange

That was yet again an excellent episode from Rinne no Lagrange. The creators had a particularly nice role for Muginami here, leading up to a finale that finally made the whole premise behind this series a bit more intriguing. And on top of that the artistic direction was particularly solid this episode.

Also, this show has found a very good way to keep me entertained during the quiet parts when it’s building up. The chemistry between the characters still is as sharp as ever. I’m referring to those small details, like Madoka getting lost inside the building for a while, or the way in which the officer forgot one of her hair curlers. The energy drinks were fun too. It all just brings life to these characters, much more beyond what you would have expected at first.

The battle in this episode also wasn’t brainless action, but instead really focused on the characters here, as the titular Rinne finally makes its appearance.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Aquarion Evol – 06

by psgels, posted in Aquarion Evol

This episode returned to the action.And well… it was just over the top, like everything else in this series. In particular the focus on Shrade was just meant to kick ass and be as grand as possible. Now, I know Shoji Kawamori, so I’m not going to be trolled by one of those twists again, but his entire performance in this episode was just wonderful. The soundtrack in this series is great, but it’s at its best when he is involved.

In comparison, that dog bad guy still needs a bit of work. He has potential as Mikono’s future groom, but right now his characters still isn’t interesting enough, not to mention that he pulled a very cliched retreat at the end of this episode. Again though: this episode promised some interesting connections; now live up to those!

Going back to that soundtrack… how big is it anyway? I mean, there are series that have two or three good tracks and keep repeating them, but this episode came yet again with more tracks I hadn’t heard before, and they just all kick ass. 2012 is definitely going to be an interesting year, with two Yoko Kanno series. Although I did hear that a lot of this soundtrack was composed for the first season already. My guess is (considering Yoko Kanno’s inactivity for the past years) that the rest of the soundtrack was composed by the composer of Zegapain’s soundtrack. Seriously. She should do more.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Rinne no Lagrange – 05

by psgels, posted in Rinne no Lagrange

Holy crap.

I mean it’s easy to just dismiss this show based on first looks. A bunch of girls piloting mechas to save aliens? That sounds completely generic. And yet the execution and direction are just so damn good here. I mean, this is the Fafner team of Xebec, working together with Tatsuo Sato, written by the guy who wrote the second half of Darker than Black. And it’s true that the biggest sin of this series is being so generic: with an execution and staff like this, just imagine what it could have been if it had an actually good premise here.

Nevertheless, the characters in this episode were awesome. The chemistry between these guys is really fun to watch. This episode introduced the main bad guy, and this completely sets Muginami apart from the stereotypical ditzy girl she was at first. This episode first starts with revealing that she indeed is a villain, making use of some great tension between her and Lan, only to reveal afterwards that she has just been acting on her own, and instead is being seen as a parasite by her comrades.

These kinds of episodes really allow the sharp direction here to shine. The main villain is also very interesting at this point (the coat thing was very funny), and the sharpness and timing of the dialogue here is subtle, yet witty. On top of that, this show has a second season confirmed in the summer season, so there will be enough time to really flesh these characters out.
Rating: *** (Awesome)