Category: Finished Series: Adventure/Fantasy/Science Fiction

Gate: Thus the JSDF Fought There! – 09

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Gate: Thus the JSDF Fought There

So the reason Itami got married was because a girl pretty much said take care of me and I will marry you. And the reason why she divorced him was because Itami believed she saw him as a meal ticket when she had developed feelings for him. Those are oddest reasons for a marriage and breakup I have seen and even afterwards they are on good, if not better terms with each other. Can’t say I like the princess and her guard becoming fujoshis. I like the idea of old cultures experiencing modern media and suggesting the potential possibility that if this media existed back then the likes of renaissance painters and Roman emperors could easily become Anime Otakus or fanboys of any kind.

But the Fujoshi girl has become so common in anime that it has practically become a trope. It’s tiresome, namely because the joke of a Fujoshi girl is that she is a Fujoshi and all the punchline really is, is just reminding us that she’s a Fujoshi. Comedy is the weakest link of this show and proof of that is the princesses running joke of saying that she didn’t believe such things existed in this world and her subordinate reminding her that it’s another world. It wasn’t funny the first time and it certainly wasn’t funny the third or fourth time either. At most the girls going to the library to search for “Art” (AKA, BL manga) was mildly amusing at best. The best joke so far was regarding the girls saying there age during the courtroom drama but other than that most of the otaku and other jokes just fall flat.

Oh Gate, giving the soldiers codenames based on Fate/stay night servants. Just bravo sir, the nasufan within me let out a small “yay!” This episode does bring out a particular nationalist trait of the source material which turns off a lot of people off the story but I think I will save that conversation till next episode. Itami knowing the defense minister is another one of those aspects which calls to question whether he is a secret genius or a lucky idiot. The end of the episode was a major cliffhanger for some as Rory seduces Itami and most likely will get interrupted first thing next episode. All things considered, at least Itami has some very good reasons to be hesitant about this approach as regardless of her actual age, Rory still looks like a minor. But if her doesn’t help her blow off steam she’s going to go kill crazy and start chopping up soldiers while disregarding sides.

Gangsta. – 08

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Gangsta

Some focus on Alex this time around as with the drug out of her system she remembered that she had a younger brother. A pretty startling revelation for her as forgot about him the whole time she was under Barry’s control. It was done well on just how much this shocked her but I must admit that Mangalobe’s animation is getting rather limited at points. There are some points with off art and still frames are increasing but it’s still respectable that they are sticking with such difficult character designs. These anti-Twilight people have me a little confused about just how powerful Twilights are. True it’s not exactly fair to compare the normal types to the likes of the top of the line like Nicholas but if a mid class Twilight can impersonate Shizuo pulling out road signs then you would think that they would be putting up more of a fight. Maybe if the Anti-Twilights were coming after them with guns that might be something but with Melee weapons? Seems a bit odd they can’t knock a few people out. However there is that issue with the rule that Twilights can’t harm normal people but they must have a Claus for self defense seeing as Nicolas and Worick can jump in.

I wonder if there will be a time when Japan realizes that boob jokes are just not funny anymore, if they ever have been. Plus having them being made about Alex, who recently just got out of forced prostitution…makes it a little awkward. But looks like Alex won’t be going back to prostitution to make a living after all with her performance as a Diva at club Bastard.(That’s the actual name of the club.) I pity the English dub voice actress who’s going to have to do that scene as they are generally the worst scenes to transition to English. Having to change the Japanese lyrics into something that works in English while also having a dub voice actress who can sing is a tall order. Add in lip syncing the lyrics and it becomes downright impossible. Still if they manage to pull it off I feel the scene would improve greatly as having her sing in Japanese when she isn’t japanese in a non Japanese setting doesn’t really fit. I understand that is something that cannot be helped but having it in English would make a whole lot more sense. Gangsta is currently getting a broadcast dub by Funimation so when they get to this episode I say godspeed to them. Though the big part of the scene was what seems to be her younger brother walking past the club and recognising his sisters singing. He looks to be a big part of next week’s episode.

Gate: Thus the JSDF Fought There! – 08

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Gate: Thus the JSDF Fought There

Itami continues to be a mystery as he is shown not only to be a ranger but also a member of special forces. Its not really confirmed whether he is a genius in hiding or a slacker who was tossed into high profile positions and got through it with minimum effort. The big part of this episode was the court case where a young female politician tried to put the army at fault for a number of other world civilians dying in a dragon attack. This is another design change that I find has made the character far too young as the politician I remember from the manga was a much older woman. I don’t know how the novel/LN did it but I feel that having her be a much more mature woman made more sense. Call me jaded but I don’t think a woman that young and good looking would be anywhere near politics. But admittedly I don’t know jack about politics.

However her dialogue where she attempts to make use of her age to demand respect is made all the stranger. In general I always felt that older woman would use their age to demand respect but woman in the 20 to 30 range don’t really like to draw attention to their age. Though when Rory was calling her little girl this could have be a weak attempt to try and gain some kind of moral superiority. Though it doesn’t really matter too much as this character’s sole purpose is to be an idiot while making Rory look good.So no surprise that the highlight of the episode was Rory shutting her up by telling her off on live TV. As well as letting the bomb drop that she is over 900 years old and Tuka is 165 years old. This is really the first time the otherworld has caught modern society off guard as the concept of someone being that old as well as someone becoming a literal God once they reach 1000 is unthinkable. Something tells me that this fact would bring up some problems with christianity that might lead to some misguided crusade to rid the world of the “fake” gods.

Otherwise there was just small things like Rory being terrified of the subway due to the God Hardy who is interested in taking Rory as their wife. Its also interesting to note that unless I am mistaken, Hardy is female. So Rory happens to have a lesbian earth god after her. This girl never ceases to amuse. The episode ends with a rather shocking reveal of Itami’s ex-wife. A main character with an ex-wife, I haven’t seen that since…um…ever actually. I am sure if I dig up some anime I haven’t seen in a while I might find a couple with characters with ex-wives but main characters who were married doesn’t happen very often. Mostly because they are too young to be. When Itami’s wife seems to be the kind of person he would meet, seeing as she’s a mangaka. And for a separated couple they sure are on good terms. Chances are these two didn’t get married normally.

Gangsta. – 07

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Gangsta

Now the past has been mostly revealed, Worick’s friendship with Nicholas has become a more complex thing. Worick seems to see him as a good friend yet resent him for going kill crazy and murdering his whole family. Though the murder of his father looked to be an order he himself made to Nicholas and regretted. Honestly I am having trouble understanding just what there relationship is. I can’t tell whether Worick hates or likes Nicholas and whether Nicholas killed Worick’s family because of an order or rather out of resentment for Worick buying Celebrer off his father and giving him reason to ditch Nicholas. The whole affair comes across as Worick making a deal with the devil what with Nicholas ripping out Worick’s eye as some sort of payment. I still don’t like the one sided nature of Woricks father as I really don’t know what could spur on this level of violence. The only real factor given in this anime for his hatred is that he knows that Worick is smarter than him and that makes him feel inferior, or at least from what I can gather. There are likely other factors but it isn’t really made clear.

So yet again we have a Twilight defying gravity like no tomorrow, if I didn’t know better I would say this show was trying to spite me. No matter what I say these guys are here to stay so all I can do is try to accept their presence. Which is getting more difficult as they now have Darker than black Contract prices such as the kid not aging past puberty and Nicholas being deaf. That’s just…never mind, its here to stay so if Twilights also happen to be able to shoot ki blasts my only option is to roll with it. It’s nice to see Alex become more assertive even when I am certain no one else other than Worick would have reacted to that wake up embrace quite as calmly. She’s a much better character now that the drug is out of her system though I do wonder if she really plans to continue being a prostitute. So we have two new twilights on the block who have been killing other twilights and collecting tags and they remind me of the vampire twins of black lagoon. It’s hard to get a read on them for how briefly they were shown but they come off so far as a rather generic villain.

Gate: Thus the JSDF Fought There! – 07

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Gate: Thus the JSDF Fought There

I understand that for an anime adaption some character designs need to be simplified in order for an easier time to keep them in proportion in animation. But while the characters who suffer in this episode because of this are indeed minor characters, its really a shame to see them become something unrecognisable. The two characters in question are Perisa the Catgirl and Delilah the warrior bunny. Now despite how the job is treated with no humor whatsoever, I am fully aware that the words warrior bunny is about as easy to take seriously as a shark tax accountant. It’s even harder to try to accept when the girls look as young as they do in the anime series. In the manga designs the girls had a level of maturity which really lent to their characters but from the looks of things they went with the Light novel designs which make them look far too young and Persia with pink hair just throws me off completely.

This episode goes to show that even with the best laid plans nothing will really go as expected. Because someone is bound to mess things up no matter how hard you try. In this case a blond Drill haired girl who first dragged Itami back to the city beaten and bloody without thinking and her assaulting him again when she went to his room on orders to sleep with him in order to get the JSDF to forget about the incident and was promptly unintentionally ignored when she entered his crowded room. The pain the princess felt when that came to light is one I am all too familiar with. You give someone one simple job and yet somehow they find a way to bugger it up. It’s quite amazing we humans can get anything done together at all.

The joy of the episode is seeing just how desperate the princess gets as the episode goes on. She the first of the major players if the empire to realize just what they are facing and there’s even a point where her composure momentarily breaks while misunderstanding Itami’s position in the army. By the time she makes it to the base to apologise for the incident, she’s like a scolded child. Next episode looks to have the otherworlders visit Japan which should at least give them a taste of information age culture.

Gangsta. – 06

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Gangsta

When taking into account the show so far, I find that the quiet character moment stand out far more than the over the top fight scenes with knife wielding psychos on rooftops. The dialogue between characters is much more engaging that two characters jumping around like Bleach Soul Reapers. In particular it great seeing Worick and Nicholas talk especially when Worick’s doing most of the talking while Nicholas is saying the bare minimum. It shows that Worick has been around him for such a long time that he can tell what he wants to say just from his face and movements. The back story about Worick teaching him to write as a kid and being kindred spirits in abusive environments is all really great stuff.

One flaw I found with this episode however was the use of the age old stock character for tragic back stories. The alcoholic abusive father. That’s even above the overbearing religious zealot parent in backstory tropes. A prime example of just how overused this is that before I watched this episode, I watched a DC animated feature called “Superman vs the Elite” (Which despite the title and some lacking animation, was quite a good animated movie) and when it came to a character’s tragic back story time what kind of father had he? Alcoholic abusive father. I certainly are not saying that people like that don’t exist in reality however in cases of entertainment it just seems like a writer taking the easy route instead of building a more morally complex abuser. Or at least something less cliche, like Nicholas’s father who got a twilight prostitute pregnant and decided to make use of the kids abilities as opposed to just getting rid of him. As well as the fact that his father killed his mother. It’s still fairly one dimensional but at least it isn’t a standard trope.

As it turns out Alex wasn’t kidnapped and the visitor turned out to be the doctor like I suspected. Thankfully mangalobe didn’t go to weird heights again as Alex’s hallucinations were in fact the result of withdrawal symptoms from the drug Barry was feeding her to keep her in line. After checking up I am fairly certain this drug was fictitious as well as while there are pimps who use drugs to keep girls in line there aren’t drugs like what was described here. Closest thing to it from what I can find would be a liquid called toluene. Still, made up or not I like how it affected Alex as she went back on the streets prostituting herself over fear of an imaginary Barry. It explains the sudden mental instability of Alex better than a quickly appearing trauma. I a hoping that now without the drugs influence she will become more active in the show as she does need a little more personality. I am hoping for more episodes like this in the future.

Gate: Thus the JSDF Fought There! – 06

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Gate: Thus the JSDF Fought There

Richard Wagner’s “Ride of the Valkyries” is a fairly iconic piece of music in pop culture. So much so that after Apocalypse Now (1979) whenever there is a helicopter assault in any piece of media, it’s practically obligatory to play Ride of the Valkyries. Even just today when finishing Far Cry 3 and had a helicopter turret sequence near the end of the game, what was playing in the background? Ride of the Valkyries. Gate however went above and beyond just referencing Apocalypse Now with the song. The straight up quoted and referenced it throughout the sequence, some scenes of animation being recreations of the the films scene itself. It’s glorious to behold. Though Rory’s fan service moment before the battle was certainly on the gratuitous side, while it is true that I have no idea what the effect of dozens of human souls flowing through you is like, it being like an aphrodisiac isn’t the first thing to come to mind.

It is a matter that bothered me before but I am not fond of the princesses character design in the anime. In the Light novel and manga her design had a much more mature look, where as her anime design just looks far too young. Animation for Gate remains to be inconsistent as at times it can be quite fluid but can drop to levels of still frames. Admittedly it’s not easy to animate army battles but it would be good to remain consistent in animation as opposed to dropping between low and high. Though even at its best I have found A1s animation to be rather rough. In particular with Rory’s battle while good there were times the animation seemed off. The princess finally knows who she’s dealing with and it was rather amusing to see them shocked at them accepting what would be losers terms when by all rights they could have had her at their mercy. It’s a pity her soldiers are not quite as informed and may have made the greatest mistake of their lives by episodes end.

Gangsta. – 05

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Gangsta

This point I will likely hammer into the ground but I will repeat it as long as it remains to be a problem. The twilight superpowered humans are just not suited for this show and what’s worse is that they are taking it over. I tried this episode to embrace the idea that these characters are here to stay and are a part of the setting but they just seem so absurd that this becomes impossible. The fight between Nicholas and the knife boy was just ridiculous in it’s presentation. You can say these are strengthened humans and add in made up drugs that remove pain limiters but you just can’t have a character use a guy’s shoulder to propel himself five stories high and expect me to accept that. Gravity still exists no matter how strong you are. On that note was it really necessary to invent a drug which basically functions as a powerful painkiller and to give it a name as strange as “Celebrer”?  That name makes it sound more like a celebrity gossip column than a drug. Basically when it comes to the Twilights this show operated on Shounen rules such as gravity is non existent and all wounds heal with bandages. But the other aspects function more as a Seinen rules causing a strange disconnect between the two worlds.

We also have the introduction of this new scared army woman who is in charge of a large group of twilights and keeps them in line. I will refrain from making a comparison to a certain show again but it’s pretty obvious just who this character is like. One thing that worries me about this show is a potential jump the shark moment with Alex’s pimp. It’s unlikely but with the complete ridiculousness of Samurai Flamenco, I can’t rule out the possibility of the pimp being still alive. The twilights shaking off knife wounds are not helping matters. I don’t think this show will slip up with such a grievous misstep and it’s much more likely Alex was just hallucinating due to her own trauma. If anything it makes more sense that the doctor kidnapped her as he did have the same umbrella. But the fact that I cannot rule it out is a concern. At the moment I admit that my interest in this show is slipping and while we learned a little backstory about Nicolas taking on Monroe’s goons once as a kid and nearly decimating them, I find that it doesn’t really give much insight into his character. The thing that caught my attention more was the mention of the girl called Verona who apparently overdosed on the painkiller drug. What she is to Nicholas is a much more interesting question than what was Nicholas’s track record of killing goons. Overall for this show to improve I think we need more character building episodes and the action to be more grounded in reality.

Gate: Thus the JSDF Fought There! – 05

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Gate: Thus the JSDF Fought There

This episode focused on the third princess and her past efforts to make an order of female knights a respected force in the king’s army. Naturally being an all female group in a medieval society doesn’t exactly get them a lot of respect. The king looks to be treating them as a glorified ornament. But she’s pulled into siege warfare as the town she is visiting is being assaulted by remnants of their own forces and the town leader is too young to take charge of the defense. There’s an ongoing war and everyone’s too busy fighting each other to fight the enemy. Humanity at its finest. The fact that they need to accept aid from their otherworldly enemy just to fight off bandits from their own world is testament to how ludicrous the situation is. Out of the female leads so far, the princess seems the most level headed. Her leadership skills are good and looks to be decent strategist though their was some ditzyness on her part by accidentally knocking Itami to the ground while enthusiastically throwing open the doors. But she still has the same level of ignorance as the rest of the other world regarding the JSDF as she uses them as a suicidal front line in order to fortify the town. Thats a bit like using a rocket launcher as a makeshift baseball bat.

Rory looks to be getting fairly attached to Itami as she questions him here and Itami puts clear what he intends. Its the right idea to show off just what they are capable off as the biggest issues is in how the medieval world has no idea of their level of power. Itami intends it as a message to get along with them instead of fighting but Rory is right in that they will be effectively terrifying the princess with a display of power. A moment that I truly am looking forward too. There’s just something satisfying about seeing these people in blank awe of military might. It’s reminiscent of soldiers reaction to Berserks Guts cutting down people with his sword. The moment when the person finds out they are utterly outmatched in every way. The end of the episode gives a big decision to our princess as she can choose to call over the JSDF after sending them on a suicide mission or attempt to fight to the end with her remaining forces. In any case it’s doubtful Itami will just stand by as bandits raid the town.

Gate: Thus the JSDF Fought There! – 04

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Gate: Thus the JSDF Fought There

Not much to talk about this episode as it was mainly set up to the next. The army’s reputation looks to have risen after driving off a dragon and looks to have caught the attention of our new female character. I was about to sigh when I saw the old anime staple of a bath scene but honestly from a fanservice standpoint it was barren. Alright, there was one shot of the elf girl but frankly it was only a second long and not too gratuitous. It’s nice to seen a anime take the higher road and not just shove in fanservice disregarding the tone of the show for the sake of pandering to otaku. (Looking at you, Ranpo Kitan) the main bulk of the episode was about our three heroines integrating into the army camp. Rory looks to be going with the flow, while mage girl is taking steps to better communicate and understand them. Though elf girl is reserved and avoiding the army. Partly because of her trauma involving the dragon attack on her village and partly from getting thrown into a world so different from her home.

Admittedly when the show shifts to show countries other than Japan discussing the gate its a little one dimensional. Though truth be told if a gate to another world did open then its true that every country would be itching to get their greedy hands on it. Thing is that Japan wouldn’t be the exception in this case, they would be just as greedy. An interesting point did come up in this episode that if the gate is a paradise of bountiful resources then it could lead to Japan taking on the world to hold a monopoly on it. Though I question this as the gate only has a single point of entry not making it the best way to farm resources considering that all resources would need to pass through this one small gateway. That’s going to be one big traffic jam in the making. I know it’s not exactly new for me to say this but the weakest part of the show happens to be the comedy. Itami’s otaku nature is often used for jokes but it’s ultimately the same punchline, that Itami is a massive otaku. The other jokes unrelated to that can have rare moments, such as a general calling a dragon a one headed Ghidorah. The next episode looks to be when the princess of the kingdom and Itami’s squad encounter each other. Sparks are inbound.