Category: Finished Series: Action

Mobile Suit Gundam 00 – 37

by psgels, posted in Mobile Suit Gundam 00



Short Synopsis: Saji and Louise angst about each other.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 6,5/10 (Lacking)
So, yeah. As the synopsis does suspect: this wasn’t the most exciting episode. I really hoped that Saji and Louise grew up during the past twelve episodes, but they still kept angsting like there was no tomorrow. The concept between the two of them really is fine: two former lovers who end up at opposing sides; it really has potential. If only the two of them weren’t such immature brats. What actually gets me the most is the huge amount of airtime that’s spent on the two of them, while the series really has so many better uses for that.

Anyway, what I did like was the one-sidedness of the war against Kataron. These guys really don’t stand a chance against the super-weapons, especially now that their main space fleet has been wiped out. After they’re taken care of, Kataron is going to run out of opponents aside from the celestial beings, so it’s about time that we’re introduced to the final party in this series. With all the references to past Gundam Franchises, I’m almost positive that the creators are also going to use a few Gundam Wing references, where the Roquefeller foundation was simply brought down by inner conflict. We’ve already seen that a lot of the members of A-Laws don’t agree with their extreme measures, so who knows?

It’s also interesting that finally Ribbons is running into something that he didn’t expect. Finally we see more sides of the guy, which is a good thing.

Shikabane Hime – 12

by psgels, posted in Shikabane Hime



Short Synopsis: “It” has happened. I’m not going to spoil here what exactly “it” is, but you can pretty much guess.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8,5/10 (Awesome)
After the previous episode, I already had some suspicion that this episode would be awesome, and indeed it did deliver wonderfully. This episode formed an amazing climax of the first season, and really brought out the best in the characters. Does Keisei’s end beat Kamina’s? In my opinion, it does, but that may also be because I’m a much bigger fan of Shikabane Hime than that I was of Gurren Lagann. ^^;

My suspicion is that the second season is going to be a lot more linear than the first one: after all, we now have an established main couple, we have six enemies that need to be taken care of. Still, on the other hand it is going to benefit from really fleshed out characters. If it manages to use this build-up well, then we can expect something amazing from that second season.

Anyway, about the episode: it really was action-packed from beginning to end. Keisei went down like a real man: he knew his end was coming, and yet he tried to protect Ouri and Makina till the end, while trying to get rid of the human bad guy (name?!) at the same time, and at the same time Ouri has matured enough to realize that in these sorts of situations, he needs to take responsibility and grab his chance to protect others (in this case preventing Makina from turning into an ordinary Shikabane), even though it involves him getting hurt in the process.

Shikabane Hime – 11

by psgels, posted in Shikabane Hime



Short Synopsis: Keisei’s background gets revealed while the seven enemies finally attack.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8/10 (Excellent)
Holy crap! I knew it. I freakin’ knew it! The series had already been hinting at it with the Minai-arc, and the ED really confirmed it as we see Ouri standing next to Makina with Keisei’s staff. What I didn’t suspect was that it looks like that it’s going to be none other than Ouri himself who gets to have the honour of killing him. Yeah. That’s one sure way of getting the guy at the centre of the storyline, and it indeed looks like the first season was just one big build-up for the second season.

But before he’s going to kick the bucket, I’m glad to see that the creators have found enough time to tell a bit about his back-story. I originally assumed that he and Makina were good friends when she got murdered, while in fact they hardly even knew each other, and instead they got together when he was ordered to take up Makina as his Shikabane Hime. It also turns out that the human bad guy (what was his name again?) was sort-of as an upperclassman to him, rather than just a random colleague and the cafe owner also grew up with the two of them for a bit, before he got his own Shikabane Hime assigned (not sure if that was already mentioned before).

Mobile Suit Gundam 00 – 36

by psgels, posted in Mobile Suit Gundam 00



Short Synopsis: Celestial Being’s home base gets discovered.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8/10 (Excellent)
Ah, I must say that this episode ranks among the best episodes of the second season so far. After the build-up it’s finally time for some serious developments, and I really wonder what the celestial beings are going to do now, now that they’ve lost their home base. All that’s left is to make the innovators move away from the evil overlords that they currently are, and I’ll be entirely happy.

And more references to the original Gundam this episode: multiple parts. While it’s not as extreme as splitting an entire mecha in three, the docking scene really reminded me of the “transformation sequences” of the original Gundam. I also liked how the rivalry between Sumeragi and Mannequin is starting to look more and more interesting.

Regarding Anew, it seems that there’s a more complex story behind her than simply being a traitor. When Revive sent his mind crush through the Ptolemy, her reaction wasn’t like someone who had successfully deceived everyone and felt that she accomplished her mission. It felt more like “crap, they found out!”, suggesting that she betrayed the Innovators instead. In the meantime, Nena demonstrates once again that something’s seriously wrong with her, as she plans to kill off Wan Liu Ming because she can’t touch Ali Al Sarshes.

And I must say that it was quite a strange way for the creators to make Saji and Louise find out about each other. Just let the whole transcendental plane that everyone was in become a central part of the story, and not as a cheap Deus ex Machina to bring these two people together. It’s good that Saji finally gained his sense of duty, and let’s hope that he’s not going back into emo-mode in the next episode.

Mobile Suit Gundam 00 – 35

by psgels, posted in Mobile Suit Gundam 00



Short Synopsis: Rivonze reveals a destructive death-ray from his arsenal, the final Innovators get introduced and a certain crazy deranged returns.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 7,5/10 (Good)
Okay, just when you thought that those innovator names couldn’t get any weirder after Revive Revival. “Bring Stability”, “Anew Returner”, “Healing Care”… you’d wonder whether these guys are trying to prove a point or something. And the weird names are one thing; I actually think that they’re simple code names, but why doesn’t Rivonze have such a ridiculous name, I wonder? If they’re going to create a patter, why shouldn’t the leader be called something as Imake Anewworld, or whatever.

In any case, in order to create this new world, the Innovators have another typical Gundam staple on their hands: the incredibly huge death ray, this time nicknamed Memento Mori. It’s getting fired surprisingly early, though. Its power in the other Gundam series is that it couldn’t be used often due to the huge energy consumption, but when it was used, then things turned out baaaad. An overuse of such a huge weapon… well, Code Geass showed that to us. The whole thing loses impact. But then again, it would be bad for this series to follow too much into the footsteps of the other Gundams, and of course, firing it from one of the energy towers does explain why it can be fired quite easily, although I do want to see countries running out of energy in the next episode.

The cliff-hanger of this episode was a pretty bad one, simply because it was so incredibly obvious that Sergei is just going to survive. It’s a bit too predictable. On the other hand, I didn’t see Hallelujah’s return coming, even though that one was built up nicely by a few subtle hints. This also confirms that Soma Peries hasn’t completely left, and I wonder what’s going to happen if she ends up against Hallelujah.

Anew Returner obviously is a spy, having been sent by Wang Liu Mei, but the question still remains how exactly she’s related to the Innovators: is she like Nena, or instead a direct subordinate of Rivonze? I could have sworn seeing her somewhere with the other Innovators at one point, so I guess it’s the latter.

What the series now needs to do is make sure of the political repercussions of the Memento Mori death ray. Surely, people are going to doubt the good intentions of A-Laws when they’re firing at their own people and allies, and the resistance against these people should increase.

Shikabane Hime – 10

by psgels, posted in Shikabane Hime



Short Synopsis: A TV-priest uses his Shikabane Powers to impress viewers.
Highlights: Finally it looks like the show’s about to arrive at the real meat of the story.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 7/10 (Enjoyable)
Well, like Birdy the Mighty Decode, it looks like the whole first season is just meant as one big build-up for the second season. This episode finally introduced the major antagonists: the seven blacked out people from the OP. Half of the episode portrayed them as Shikabane who track other Shikabane down and kill them, the other half portrayed them as ruthless schoolgirl killers. Yeah, they were the ones who killed Makina, and they’re probably the real reason why she’s fighting as Shikabane Hime.

The rest of the episode was pretty quiet, but that makes sense. If the creators want to end the first season with a big climax, then this is the perfect place for a bit of a quiet pace before the final arc. My guess is that there, Ouri is going to get his own Shikabane. Whether he’s going to take over Makina, or his big boobed classmate is going to play that role is still the question.

Speaking of which, they were nice and all but these boob jokes really have to end at some point. It’s not really those jokes themselves that get me, but rather that Ouri’s classmates has been turned into a paper bag by them. He started out as quite an enthusiastic classmate, but nowadays all he’s good for is to oogle over all the pretty girls that surround Ouri. Really, get a life!

Bonen no Xamdou – 17

by psgels, posted in Bonen no Xamdou



Short Synopsis: Nakiami arrives at Tessik, Haru starts moving again, Akiyuki still really doesn’t do anything, his mother discovers her ex-husband’s little secret and Kagisu is one big bastard.
Highlights: Still surprisingly quiet, and still surprisingly engaging.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8/10 (Excellent)
I must say that with the current arc, Bonen no Xamdou has really set itself apart from all other anime. Sure, this isn’t the first time where a middle arc takes a step back in favour of a quiet atmosphere, dedicated to fleshing out the side stories, but I can’t recall having such an arc so well done as this one. This arc not only gets the chance to flesh out a number of the side-plots and set up for the finale, but it also pushes the story more forward and especially it never stops developing the characters.

I also now understand what the title of this series means. When Akiyuki first showed up with that mask, I really didn’t suspect that the creators actually had the guts to just put him into a vegetable state for more than three episodes, and who knows when he’s going to recover? The “Lost Memories”-part of the title seems to suggest that his lost memories will form a central theme and focus in the series, so the chance might be that it’s going to take until episode 26 for that to happen.

If this series is ultimately about Akiyuki’s lost memories, then we can also predict a bit what will happen to Furuichi. He’s been continuously portrayed as Akiyuki’s rival, or antagonist, and both of their “senses” disappeared around the same time, suggesting that they’re meant to show the same process through different roads. Incidentally, both of them threw away their faces, they just did it in different ways. We’re going to have to wait a bit to see what this actually means, but the eye-ball is definitely a huge clue, especially since it started talking and eating in this episode. My suspicion is that this eye-ball is Akiyuki’s Hiruko, who’s managing to free himself from his arm. This episode revealed that those strange wobbly thingies are actually the Hiruko who are unbound to a human being, and who knows: perhaps there are more forms of these creatures?

Also, Haru seems to be coming into action again in the next episode! That sudden laugh of her seems to suggest that she hasn’t just grown stronger, but still, like everything in this series I really doubt that that hysterical laugh was what it looked like. She really does have guts, though, and I wonder what she’s going to do after escaping: saving her sister, searching for Akiyuki or doing something completely different?

Mobile Suit Gundam 00 – 34

by psgels, posted in Mobile Suit Gundam 00



Short Synopsis: Ptolemy launches into space again.
Highlights: Mostly build-up, but solid build-up.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 7,5/10 (Good)
And so the Ptolemy is back into space again. Most of this episode was spent on building up, and a few small fight, like Tieria vs Ali al Sarshes. What especially striked me was that Tieria is turning from the most mature member of the four Gundam-pilots into he least mature one. At this point, he’s the only one who is still being driven by negative emotions as revenge: Setsuna grew up, Allelujah got rid of Hallelujah and met Marie, and Neil got replaced by Lyle, who was even more mature than himself.

On other news, my fears got confirmed in this episode by showing the male version of Nena (ugh… guys with pink hair should NEVER be allowed in anime). My guess is that there are eight innovators in total, where the final two are the new pilot recruited by A-Laws and the mysterious man or woman in the preview are the final two. The question still remains where they came from. With the original Gundam-series, this was explained by a simple genetic trait that only pops up very rarely, but with every innovator having a male and female version, you have to wonder whether Nena’s brothers were her genuine brothers, or that she simply was adopted. It’s also interesting that unlike newtypes, innovators don’t have improved physical abilities, but instead have “The Third”-like powers, of being able to hack into any machinery you’d like.

Shikabane Hime – 09

by psgels, posted in Shikabane Hime



Short Synopsis: A couple of high schoolers explore an abandoned building.
Highlights: The cat! (I shouldn’t be reminded of when saying that…
Overall Enjoyment Value: 7,5/10 (Good)
A more quiet episode, but those are needed too. This one is especially useful, as it gives Ouri some development, sheds some light on the cat, and contributes a bit to the world that this series is set on. It’s a small detail, but very useful: with people shooting with machine guns at zombies, it was only a matter of time before people would start stalking Makina.

So as it turns out, Ouri isn’t Keisei’s real brother after all, but I guess that probably explains why the guy moved out of the house so early. While I shouldn’t be surprised at this point about this, he turns out to be adopted, and was leading god knows what sort of life before that. He arrived at Keisei’s house with complete memory loss, and took ages before learning everything. He finally got motivated once he made friends with a little kitten he picked up.

At one point, the cat died, though something strange went on with its spirit, and it returned as a ghost that only Ouri could see. Or talk to anyway, since this episode reveals that Makina can see it as well. Thanks to the support of this cat, I think that Ouri was able to fully recover from his trauma and lead a good life. And I guess that because of the cat, he’s been treating Makina and Minai as real people. Makes sense.

The slapstick was really weird in this episode, but what surprised me even more that I found myself laughing at those boob-jokes and horny classmates. It was cute, and didn’t feel annoying at all, even though similar attempts in other series have made me edge to ALT-F4 more often than not.

Bonen no Xamdou – 16

by psgels, posted in Bonen no Xamdou



Short Synopsis: Nakiami and Yango continue to travel together.
Highlights: Even when building up, this show delivers.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8/10 (Excellent)
Ah, my suspicions came true with the arrival of the second half. This series is getting really good now, even in episodes like this one where hardly anything happens apart from building up. It’s especially a delight when the crew of the Zanbani shows up again: for the past episodes these guys have been the epitomes of doing nothing, and yet those short scenes between them have a huge power to them.

The majority of the episode talked about one of the white haired kids that the military managed to secure in the previous episode and the relationship between Yungo and Nakiami. Regarding the former, he shed a lot of light into what these people can do, they even can communicate through large distances. They also seem to be picky about the ones they want to turn into the Xam’d: the guy never even bothered giving his powers to the military guys, and yet he seems strangely interested in Haru (through the tips of Nazuma).

About the latter, there were some things that struck me above the bond that these two develop. Their journey made it clear that there’s a lot more stuff going on than just the main storylines of this series. It’s been a typical episode to bring a bit of life to the world that the series is set in, something you really don’t see often. More often with travel series, I notice that the life purpose of the unimportant side characters seems to be waiting for the travelling main character to arrive and solve his/her problems. But instead, the people that Nakiami and Yungo met had definitely their own problems, and just happened to meet the two. Especially the two kids, who Yungo talked to for a bit were very natural-sounding. Another series where I’ve noticed this effect was Porfy no Nagai Tabi, during its shortest arcs.

Artistically, this was also a beautiful episode. This really is a series that needs to be watched in HD.