Category: Finished Series: Adventure/Fantasy/Science Fiction

Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu – 16

by psgels, posted in Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu



Yes! This episode headed into the right direction! These are the episodes I want to see! Screw the politics of this series, the finale of this show needs to be about its characters. This episode really added a lot of depth to them, especially to Ferris and her brother. With this episode, I at least got a glimpse of why the second half of this show is supposed to be awesome.

This episode pretty much didn’t touch the story of the warring nations, and instead it showed some of Ferris’ background, her relationship with her brother, and it developed Ryner’s relationship with her as he found out more about her. This is the kind of character development that I’ve been waiting for for what feels like ages now. I also really liked how this episode cemented Ferris’ brother as one heck of a sunovabitch here. And to make matters even better, the creators are also really making Milk more bearable. She was just as annoying in this episode, but the few bits of drama around her felt much more genuine than in those earlier episodes.

Still, this episode in no way fixes all of the problems of this series: its politics still are uninteresting, and the reason why this episode was so good was because it didn’t put any attention to it. Now that I mention it, the reason the first four episodes were so good was because they also didn’t have much of a focus on the politics. It’s usually a genre I really like, because of the many different directions you can go in, and how it can provide pretty deep insights on its setting, though Denyuuden never really felt like that. I’m also missing creativity.

On top of that, I still don’t trust the anime creators, and whether they’re going to be able to stuff the good parts in the nine remaining episodes. They did take an awful lot of time for the boring stuff and the introductions, not to mention that I have seen the previous works of the director, which were all badly planned out. And I know that directors are accompanied by writers who do the series composition and all, but that doesn’t make me less worried here when we’re talking about the guy who wrote the anime adaptation of Kurogane no Linebarrels…
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Katanagatari – 10

by psgels, posted in Katanagatari



A really good episode this time, whose entire purpose was to relate back to the past: for Togame it showed her childhood, and Shichika related back to his past matches. On top of that, it was quite an interesting episode in the way that the sword this time was one who produced illusions, making it an interesting one for the mind games, plus an actual sword with a self-consciousness.

I also feel like this series is getting better and better at pacing itself. Really, these episodes have more dialogue than you can shake a stick at, yet I wasn’t bored for a second, even though I my broken Japanese didn’t understand everything that was said. That’s exactly what I’m looking for in a “tons of dialogue”-series. I mean, it’s easy to read an entire essay that goes on for ages (just look at that recent Musashi movie from Mamoru Oshii), but it’s much more difficult to make the dialogue blend in with the animation and storytelling. I’m glad that Katanagatari found a way to keep itself from getting boring or tedious.

The thing I also like a lot here is that Togame and Shichika feel just like a real couple. Very refreshing in anime where half of the creators don’t know the meaning of that word at all. Finally we can see some actual intimacy, rather than people beating each other up at the slightest romantic tension.

As for the final episodes, I think we’ve established the final bad guys at this point by now. The next two episodes should resolve everything. With two hours left, that should be more than enough time, considering how easy it was to plan in this series over 12 episodes. My biggest worry right now is that Hitei might prove to not be the most interesting opponent. It’s all going to depend on how that final episode can give her more depth than she has now.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu – 16

by psgels, posted in Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu



Recap. And not a good one either: most of it was told from the perspective of Ferris’ sister, so we had to endure a really annoying voice-over throughout this entire episode. Only the final part was amusing, when they tried to tally the amount of dango that Ferris has consumed throughout the series. At least that was creative.

Still, there are just nine episodes left. Withthat, I really am going to have to compare this to Koukaku no Regios: that too had a lot of potential for its storyline. It was built around a concept that was possibly even more interesting than Denyuuden’s, and yet for most of its airtime it just kept focusing on a bloody love triangle that went nowhere: out of everything that it could have chosen to focus on, it chose the most boring part, leaving the rest of the story as a giant rushed mess. That’s what I’m starting to fear that Denyuuden will turn into: I am really willing to believe that this series gets really awesome in its second half and all, but I’m not sure whether the anime creators also believe this. We’re talking about the same guy who wrote the adaptation of Kurogane no Linebarrels here… Will 9 episodes really be enough?
Rating: — (Lacking)

Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu – 15

by psgels, posted in Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu



An intermezzo, and it doesn’t really help that Milk returned. I understand that it’s necessary to build up the upcoming arc with a solid introduction (which had better be awesome, by the way), but more than half of this episode consisted out of the same character antics that have gotten old by now.

Here’s the thing: Ryner developed more when he was in prison than afterwards. The entire purpose of the previous arc was building up, but in itself it did not evolve this series in any way, other than increase the intrigue between the different countries a bit. The humour really shows this, as it’s been the same for ages now: Ferris insults Ryner as much as she can, Ryner tries to retort, and now that Milk has come into the picture she has gotten even more annoying. I did like that Ryner and Shion got to meet each other again, though. This episode should have had more of that.

Also notable was that there was one particular un-ZECXS-like animator at work on this episode. I’m not sure who or what, but for once there were scenes in which the hair of the characters didn’t stay perfectly in model, like characters were using some really strong hair-spray or something.
Rating: (Enjoyable)

Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu – 14

by psgels, posted in Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu



Well, I hope you like your morals, because this episode was full of them: “thou shalt not kill”, “killing is necessary”, “pointless murders are pointless”, “people I don’t like are better off dead”. What was supposed to have been a climactic battle ended up in all of the characters throwing these morals back and forth at each other.

While I do have my issues with this episode, it wasn’t bad by far. Instead, it was average for this series’ standards: nowhere near its best, but also far from the tedious watch that some of its other episodes were. Still, this episode did go on and on with these morals, but considering their use, they accomplished very little. This episode was meant to close off the kid arc, so you’d expect some sort of conclusion, or new twist or anything, but we already knew pretty much all of the moral slogans that the characters said here. In the end, it was mere build-up.

The biggest changes in this episode involved that boy. His parents have been slaughtered, he wakes up, cries for a minute, and after that he’s fine again. Perhaps a bit of a fast development, but it works. I liked how he actually partially took part in taking out the pink-haired couple. He progressed a lot through this arc, and even though I wonder what his point was in the overall story, this episode did give his character adequate closure, and the upcoming arcs should prove to be quite interesting after all that build-up. If it’s used well, of course.

On a side-note: this is a pretty minor issue, but it did bother me in this episode: I’m a bit confused about the concepts of space in this series: how big are these countries? How many people live in these countries? How big are their armies? How long does it take to travel from one place to the other? These were some questions that sparked my mind when suddenly Miran appeared from out of nowhere at exactly the right moment. In fact, the way that this guy keeps sticking his nose in just about every part of Shion’s plans may be a bit much.
Rating: * (Good)

Seikimatsu Occult Gakuin Review – 85/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews, Seikimatsu Occult Gakuin




The past summer really had its quantity problem, but there still were three series that really stood out to me as a breath of fresh air that may have significant flaws, but also have a delightful execution. These series are Shiki, Kuroshitsuji II and Seikimatsu Occult Gakuin. While Shiki had an incredibly solid execution and Kuroshitsuji got better and better as it went on, Occult Gakuin instead was just all over the place, which had both its advantages and disadvantages.

This series promised to be a fast-paced adventure series through the occult with its excellent and very witty first episode, but instead it turns out that it’s built around several two-episode arcs instead, focusing more on its characters while developing its plot only in the background. In Occult Academy, no episode really is like the other, with the result that you might be expecting a fast-paced action episode, only to get a bunch of episodes that focus more on the quiet type of storytelling.

On the bright side though, you’ll never know what this series will focus on next, and the episodes in which this series really goes all out were without a doubt the best episodes I watched during the entire summer season. The producers got some of the most amazing staff to write for some of the episodes, ranging from the director of Michiko e Hatchin, the director of Mouryou no Hako and Aoi Bungaku’s Hashire Melos to the writer of Noein and Birdy the Mighty Decode. There are thre episodes in this series that are so well written, portrayed and animated, that simply their presence makes this entire series worth watching.

Now, as for the rest of the series, it does have some balancing issues, and some other episodes fail to entice any excitement, and could have been cut from the series easily. The series itself spends a bit too much of its focus on developing Maya as a character, that it forgets about the other parts of the series. Because of this, some parts are rushed while others just take too long, on top of their lack of creativity compared to the better moments of the series.

Despite the balance issues, the plot does come together quite nicely in the end, though. All of the major questions get answers quite nicely and used to bring in some very interesting twists near the end. And really, amidst the countless of series that don’t seem to have any ambition, Occult Academy really tried to create something interesting, creative and diverse. It’s set up pretty much guarantees that you’ll be disappointed in one way or the other due to the lesser episodes, but for me it had enough to make up for it. I have quite a few issues with this series, but really: if those issues were fixed then this would have been a serious contender for the best series of the year and it will be awesome if more series would try to follow in this series’ footsteps.

Storytelling: 9/10 – The writing ranges from average at worst to absolutely fantastic at best. When it wants to, this series can be truly excellent at building up, but there are times in which it doesn’t have enough creativity in its script.
Characters: 8/10 – A very solid cast, but considering the premise of this series, the creators could have eliminated some overused cliches, and they could have done more with Maya’s character considering the amount of time that was put in her development.
Production-Values: 9/10 – Gorgeous and creative animation that really brings the characters to life.
Setting: 8/10 – Explores the occult from all over the world. Very interesting as a kaleidoscope throughout the supernatural, though never really goes in-depth.

Suggestions:
– Baccano
– Michiko e Hatchin
– Kaiba

Seikimatsu Occult Gakuin – 13

by psgels, posted in Seikimatsu Occult Gakuin



Okay, so this turned out to be an ending that I both loved and hated. Let’s just get the bad part over with first:

– Okay you discovered that the real Nostradamus Key was a dimensional time-rift created by Bunmei meeting his former self. The most logical step is now to get Bunmei out of that time-line as fast as possible in order to make the chance of him running into his child version as small as possible, NOT to just wait a day, invite younger Bunmei INTO THE SCHOOL, and just hope that everything goes well.
– Everything seems lost, the aliens have arrived, the world is about to go to hell, and here Bunmei comes, grabs younger Bunmei’s spoon, suddenly gets his powers back and blasts the aliens back to their own time-line. Where the hell did that come from?

Those are the only complaints I have about this final episodes, but dammit they’re pretty big ones. The entire story was rounded off so well before especially the second point comes, and here this series decides to end with a Deus ex Machina… I’m really wondering why the creators went with that plot, out of all possible things.

Nevertheless though, I also loved this episode as a final episode of this series. I love the entire irony behind Bunmei’s part in the series, and how he actually didn’t get to have a happy ending. You’d expect something over the top, after we just learned that that witch of the previous episode was not the Key of Nostradamus, and yet this episode was incredibly quiet with an actual climax of just one minute long (with some pretty neat animation, by the way). Throughout the entire airtime, there was this slight atmosphere of panic about what was about to happen and what was about to end. This series has already proven that it’s excellent at building up, and this episode proved that once again when it built up to the point in which Bunmei would meet his younger self.

I also liked how at the end, we saw the focus shift back to Maya’s father, which was really a charming way to close off this series. Despite the weird choices made, I do consider this episode to e in my top three final episodes that we got to see this season, alongside Kuroshitsuji II and Giant Killing: all of them tried to do something very interesting in order to close themselves off, and came with interesting twists and unorthodox pacing.

Overall, even though things could have gone better for this series, it did solidify me as a fan of A-1 pictures. This series looked consistently beautiful, and a few of the episodes were really masterfully written and laid out. Like all of the previous Anime no Chikara series, it had its flaws: Sora no Oto couldn’t decide what it wanted to be, Senkou no Night Raid’s lead characters needed acting lessons and Occult Academy had its balance issues. Nevertheless, really appreciate all three of them and what they tried to do, and Occult Academy is my favourite so far. I’m not looking forward to the next installment due to Shinbo and all, but I really hope that this timeslot isn’t going to end there because there definitely is potential.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu – 13

by psgels, posted in Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu



Kiefer Knolles returns, resulting into the episode of Legendary Heroes that I enjoyed the most during the past two months. Nice.

The first half of this episode was background, which is great to see at this point, especially considering one of the characters I like the most about this series. Her absence really made me hungry for more from her, and I’m intrigued at how she allied herself with the country of the pink-haired people right now. Before this episode, I could never really take them seriously due to their looks and bland characterizations, but that king holds potential, especially in combination with her.

In the next episodes, I’m expecting more episodes like this for the other characters. The thing is that Ryner developed more in jail than during his quest so far, and I know that he spent two years in jail and all, but I still consider that he and Ferris are getting stagnant. They’re both so caught up in their act that only some over the top Alpha Stigmas can break the ice between them, and that has gotten old at this point.

What I want here is variety. Do something interesting with those characters. Evolve this series in the same way that the five episodes just kept changing and throwing us for loops. I know that this series has the potential, now don’t let this become another Koukaku no Regios!
Rating: * (Good)

Seikimatsu Occult Gakuin – 12

by psgels, posted in Seikimatsu Occult Gakuin



Not as good as the previous episode, but still a worthy climax for this series. With one exception, everything from the past episode came together very nicely, all of the major questions were answered well and sufficiently, and this episode was overall a great and action-packed closure to this series. So what the heck is up with that final episode?!

I’m surprised how many people disliked the inclusion of black and white mages. I mean, this show is called Occult Academy: right from the start it was clear that it explores occult from all over the world. Don’t black and white mages belong amongst that? Either way though, this episode really explained a lot: all of the previous monsters that tried to kill Maya were sent by that black mage. It makes full sense for her to be the key of Nostradamus, it makes full sense that Maya didn’t go around to carry her notebook everywhere around with her and to prepare some sort of backup plan. And it’s very interesting to see that Maya’s father was still alive: that’s why her death was faked in the previous episode: to prepare for that plot twist. And as if to make up for the fact that nobody seemingly dies in this episode, the creators actually did kill off a few characters.

Now, that ending intrigues me. I mean, while it’s nothing new to have some kind of “bad guy behind bad guy”, it came completely out of left field in this series. I mean, the entire series was supposed to be about getting rid of that Nostradamus Key. Maya even got up a good future when she photographed it. So why is there still an episode left, and why didn’t the future change? I’m really curious whatever plot twist the final episode has in store here.

Now, the only problem I have with this episode was how Bunmei was suddenly unkillable at the most critical moment. I mean, the creators seemed to realize that it didn’t make any sense, but they made no attempt to answer that, and it’s a very strange question to leave unanswered at this point.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Uragiri wa Boku no Namae wo Shitteiru Review – 82,5/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews, Uragiri wa Boku no Namae wo Shitteiru




Uragiri wa Boku no Namae wo Shitteiru (henceforth abbreviated as Uragiri) is a series that doesn’t start out as anything special. Its first ten episodes don’t really stand out aside from a few well written action scenes and overly campy dialogues. Still, it managed to pull itself together as a solid character-study in the end.

Uragiri is restrained, but it knows what it’s doing in terms of characters. Their development throughout the second half is well worth the wait, especially because the creators know how to use it in its action and exposition scenes. This goes for both the main and side characters, who manage to grow together into a neatly packaged whole.

There really is hardly a boring moment in the second half because of this. The entire series has this slow atmosphere, but the series never drags on: it is always exploring its characters, showing new things about them and fully detailing their worries, motivations, and the bonds they have with each other.

The action scenes get surprisingly badass as time goes on thanks to their excellent scenario, the unique visuals for this series (this show is especially good at blending in CG effects with 2D animation in order to give the whole series a very gothy feeling) and a soundtrack that on top of being excellently used, also only continues to get better and better as the series goes on.

Now, this series is technically based on a shounen ai story. To the people who are scared of gays: don’t worry, this show is nowhere near yaoi, and the gay undertones never end up taking over the show. Having said that, though, this series does have an array of very campy characters, ranging from the very eccentric dress sense that the demons in this series have, how underdeveloped the villains are compared to the lead characters and there is matter that the lead character Yuki may be a tad too much of a heaven-descended flower-child at times. There is of course being nice, but there are points in which the creators play a bit too much on his good-natured character.

This series however still has an excellent sense of build up (except for the ending; don’t ask me why, but somehow this show ends with a Deus ex Machina without resolving anything while preparing for a second season that is never going to come) and it skillfully builds its characters throughout its 24-episode run. It’s a very nice example of those series that start off without much of a fuss, but actually get pretty damn awesome near the end (emphasis on near!).

Storytelling: 8/10 – Starts off unimpressive, but gets much better as time goes on. Well balanced, a solid script and knows how to build up save for the ending.
Characters: 8/10 – A solid cast: well analyzed and developed. The bonds between them are very important in this series, and quite a bit of meaning has been put into them.
Production-Values: 9/10 – The character animation may not be much special and the characters-designs may be a bit too bishiefied, but the background art and CG are utterly gorgeous, and the soundtrack is really excellent.
Setting: 8/10 – Does what it needs to do, there are interesting concepts behind the setting and it forms a solid base for the characters to work with.

Suggestions:
– Shingetsutan Tsukihime
– Night Head Genesis
– Kobato