Category: Finished Series: Slice of Life/Drama

Hyouka – 03

by psgels, posted in Hyouka

I personally love mystery stories, but since they require much more build-up than usual, it’s always a question whether or not they will succeed in the end. Hyouka has some very good papers, though. The detail with which it portrays its characters is more than enough to keep my interest, especially since none of them try to be too annoying/stupid etc.

There are multiple ways in which this can be classified as a mystery-series. The least interesting is the detective story format of each episode. They are very impressive of the characters… until you realize that everything is written by just one guy who can plan out everything, leading to the “detective”‘s observations to just turn superhuman, turning him into something like a narrator instead.

The other type of mystery was done really well in this episode, and really convinced me to sit this series out. It’s the kind that builds up to an overall story by revealing a tiny bit each episode about the overall mystery. The previous episode started with the revival of the Literary club, they hinted at the Anthologies. This episode reveals the anthologies, along with the whole reason for reviving the literary club along with the mystery that happened so many years in the past. This episode was really good at that, ending with a great little cliff-hanger.

And I also think that this series is really good at fleshing out its characters. Their dialogue between them is inspired, but take for example at the beginning of this episode, and they touch things like the edge of teacups, or the girl adjusts her hair. Seriously, Kyoani uses its budget well here. Does that make the animation perfect… nah. There are times when the animation is a bit too bouncy, which goes against this attempt at realism. Fate/Zero meanwhile has better CG, Lupin III has more artistic artwork and camera angles, Apollon’s animation is smoother and Zetman’s is more expressive. And so we’re in a season with a ton of series with awesome animation that all stand out in their own way.

Oh, and a question to the people living in Japan: do people really make such a big deal over smoking there? I mean, it’s not unheard of for teenagers to smoke, and while it’s frowned upon, it doesn’t really seem scandalous. Also, I was wondering why that guy chose a classroom of all places to start smoking things up, since he was using a classroom and all. If he went through so much trouble to set up infrared sensors, couldn’t he have searched for a better place to do it?
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Hyouka – 02

by psgels, posted in Hyouka

My big issue with Kyoani is their lack of ambition. They’ve got some amazing animators in house. The could bring the most amazing stories to life with that. But no, we need the random antics of high school girls! In particular it’s the series Lucky Star, K-On and Nichijou which all failed to capture my interest. worst of all was Lucky Star, which I actually finished in the hopes of finding out why people were so lyrical about it. I didn’t figure it out. And it was a chore. Hyouka features high school students talking to each other a lot, but finally it’s actually going somewhere. The characters aren’t randomly yapping about the same things over and over: there is progression. That’s what caught my interest for this series, and I want to see where it’s going.

Which brings me to another quirk of Kyoani: taking really long to build up and set up everything. This is a double-edged sword: if all of the build-up gets to the point of annoyance, then it will have failed its purpose. The trick with these kinds of series is to still have something redeemable when building up. For example I rate Kobato higher than Mirai Nikki because Kobato’s first half, even though it was random and often cheesy, still was very genuine and had interesting characters. Mirai Nikki meanwhile was a drag because there were too many characters who just weren’t. Kyoani’s series try to tackle this problem with realism: having characters act realistic and down to earth. It worked well with Air and Clannad, but Haruhi and Kanon suffered from characters trying too hard to be moe, leading to me dropping both before eventually giving them a chance to properly sit them out and appreciate what they were building up for.

Hyouka is looking good. The premise of this series hasn’t come up yet (that whole another-like premise of a student dying 30 years ago), and instead it’s keeping itself busy with random trivial mysteries. The way it goes to solve these is actually quite interesting: the train of thoughts of the character sin particular is interesting to watch, even when things are as silly as wondering why five different students would borrow the same book for five consecutive weeks.

The animation of this series is also very fluid and dynamic, but it’s especially the few scenes of symbolism each episode where the artists can really show off to make this a feast for the eyes.
Rating: *+ (Great)

Some Quick First Impressions: AKB0048 and Hyouka

by psgels, posted in Hyouka, Some Quick First Impressions

AKB0048

Short Synopsis: Our lead character wants to be an idol.
Okay, so like expected, my brain just exploded by all of the reasons in which this series just does not make sense. The premise, but also the small details and decisions the characters make; for god’s sake there are just so many things about this series that are in no way possible when you think about them. The good news however, is that this was the best first episode of an idol show that I’ve seen for a year now. For once, it had no annoying characters. Surprisingly, the voice actresses (presumably members of AKB48) actually take up on cues and actually are able to act a bit. It’s nothing stellar or anything, but I expected much blander and annoying than what we got here. And granted, the idol series for the past year aren’t really a big standard to live up to (Uta Prince, Symphogear, Pretty Rythm… only Idolmaster was anywhere near decent), but still this actually felt well paced and had decent writing. It caught my interest. The big question is how on earth are they going to about the ludicrous plot of this. In the original Macross, the idols made sense in the story and had an explanation, but ever since that seems to have gone more and more into the background for Shoji Kawamori. Having an evil government that bans music is by far not enough. Oh, and I also hope that the concert scenes will be better than what they showed in this episode. Ugly dancing CG is something that I don’t ever thing has been done right.
ED: Ugly dancing CG.
Potential: 60%

Hyouka

Short Synopsis: Our lead character gets to be friends with the school idol.
Well, in a season that has so many visually standing out series, Hyouka comes and joins them with some very realistic animation. Along with its own share of very artistic shots. Other than that, this was very solid for a first episode: the dialogue is all well written, and it uses its mystery very subtly by making its mysteries small, and then explaining them with ordinary logic. The characters are already dynamic and far from cliches and it’s definitely the most realistic high school series of this season. However, Kyoani: you are some amazing animators. So why do you always have to go back to high schools? There is a vast diversity of different settings that you could explore. Well, at the very least I’m happy enough because this finally is a show I’m interested in. It’s not just random antics but this episode is clearly building up to something, and with writing and animation that are so good I’m definitely going to follow it. My only fear would be that it would take too long to build up. This series is 21 episodes long, and if it uses this well it can turn into a great series. However if this starts pulling a Pesona 4 it can get boring quite fast.
OP: Nice use of the water ripple effect. The song’s boring, though.
Potential: 85%

Natsume Yuujin-Chou Shi Review – 87,5/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews, Natsume Yuujin-Chou



Let’s get this out of the way first: out of the series that debuted in the past Winter Season, Natsume Yuujin-Chou’s fourth season was by far my favorite. Can you watch it without having seen the other three seasons? No. It very clearly builds further upon what these three seasons did. It doesn’t matter though, because every series of Natsume Yuujin-Chou is truly excellent. Few series can boast to be as genuine and heart-warming as this one.

The people who have already watched the first three seasons know what to expect: episodic stories and small arcs about a boy who can see spirits, and all of the problems and miracles that come with it. The episodic nature again makes it a very varied series that changes every week, and again this series has a very good balance between really heart-warming stories, and stories that are almost like a thriller. The stories still are very cleveryl constructed, and yet they play out very naturally and believably. This season also likes its character studies, and quite a few side-characters also manage to get their place in the spotlight to actually develop themselves a bit.

Every season of Natsume also has a slightly different tone from the other. The first was about quiet and relaxing stories about all sorts of youkai Natsume meets. Season 2 instead put the focus more on the main plot and various recurring characters. The third season was dedicated to Natsume’s development, and the fourth season is about Natsume’s relationship with the people around him. Imagine what a wonderful total picture this all creates! And indeed, the cast still is amazing, in particular Natsume has gotten so much development at this point.

What makes the fourth season stand out in particular is that out of all the four seasons, it’s got the best beginning and the best ending. It really saved its best stories for those points, and especially the ending is a treat. The stories in the middle are also very good, but not as good as the middle episodes of the first and the third season. I’d really consider the First, Third and Fourth season to be just as good, all with their own highlight and standout stories that rock in their own ways, either by being incredibly heart-warming, really well told, consistently tense and intriguing, amazingly built up, wonderfully acted, or just all of those together. This series still is a huge believer of subtlety over bombast, and this leads to some of the best acting of the season.

Storytelling: 9/10 – Great variety, masterful at retaining a subtle atmosphere, and manages to consistently tell heart-warming stories.
Characters: 9/10 – Natsume has 52 episodes of development right now, and this season just continues to add things to his character. The side characters also get a lot of time to flesh themselves out and develop.
Production-Values: 8/10 – Great and very consistent animation. Perhaps not the best of the season, but there are a few very talented animators flexing their muscles here.
Setting: 9/10 – Everyone around Natsume is the main focus of this series. Yes, the setting got even better.

Suggestions:
– xxxHolic
– Porfy no Nagai Tabi
– Tenpou Ibun Ayakashi Ayashi

Natsume Yuujin-Chou – 52

by psgels, posted in Natsume Yuujin-Chou

Yeah, this was pretty much the best ending of the season. In fact, out of all of the four natsume seasons, this season had the best final episode. This was definitely in my top 5 of favrotie Natsume episodes. If this turned out to be the last we’ll see of Natsume Yuujinchou, then I don’t mind this at all with such a wonderful closing episode.

This episode had a lot of parallels to that one episode of the third season, where Natsume met Touko (that one overall turned out to be my favorite Natsume Yuujinchou, out of all the 52 that were aired), but there were some huge differences here. Both were meant to show how hard Natsume’s childhood was, but that episode was about Natsume and his fears of not being able to do anything. This episode (and arc, really, it was about Natsume’s fears of responsibility. In this case, he wasinvited by a really nice family, and yet he didn’t want to cause any sort of trouble for them. You can see Natsume get a lot colder after the events of this episode when you look at the other flashbacks. Only when he met Touko he started to open up again.

The house part was kept wonderfully subtle. The creators said so much here with so little dialogue. It was incredibly heart-warming.

Overall, the fourth season: it has the best beginning and ending of all four seasons, while in the middle part it was a bit outclassed by seasons 1 and 3. Still, it had a point and purpose, and it still was really worth the watch. When I first started watching this, I really didn’t expect this to go on for 52 whopping episodes, but I’m definitely glad that it did. This was by far the best Winter 2012 series.
Rating: *** (Awesome)

Natsume Yuujin-Chou – 51

by psgels, posted in Natsume Yuujin-Chou

This will be the first three-episode arc of Natsume, if I’m not mistaken, right? And what a topic they picked out to do it. Next episode will be amazing. This episode meanwhile dealt with another episode in Natsume’s past.

With this, I understand why the earlier episode focused on that girl Natsume met, because this episode showed another girl he left an impression on, only in a completely different way. Where the first girl really started to sympathize with him, this time it’s about a girl who felt jealous of him, as he took away the attention of her parents, on top of being strange. Again, this is why these episodes belong in the fourth season, and not in the third. The third was all about Natsume’s development, while the fourth is about everyone around Natsume, and it develops these characters instead, with as climax Natsume’s parents.

I especially loved the part where Nyanko-sensei shrugged off that it’d still take a few years for the youkai to start getting hungry for more than just insects. Natsume really didn’t want to go back into that house again, but hearing that, you knew exactly what he was going to do.

Overall, Brains Base has really dominated the past year. I mean, out of all their releases, Kamisama Dolls was the least impressive. They delivered an awesome remake of a classic show, they came back with Kunihiko Ikuhara, and Natsume has really delivered some amazing episodes. Unfortunately it looks like this awesome streak will end next season. I’m sorry, but people need to stop re-imagining classic historical people into moe stereotypes.
Rating: **+ (Excellent+)

Natsume Yuujin-Chou – 50

by psgels, posted in Natsume Yuujin-Chou

Okay. Best episode of the fourth season yet. I was wrong.

This episode started out like your average episode: trolling about Reiko, only to go into a completely different direction. That direction was Natsume’s parents. Nowadays I rarely cry in front of an anime anymore. But this one did it. Halleluja, this show just got even better.

It’s also amazing with how little this episode ended up as a heart-wrenching story. The emotions in it were incredibly subtle, and Natsume was hiding his feelings the entire time, but this was so well portrayed that it worked wonderfully. Parts where he says that as a child, he tried to not look at the picture of his parents may seem light-hearted, but it says so much of the cold environment he grew up with. Dead parents are a cliche, but when it’s developed so well I just can’t get annoyed about it at all.

The scene that really hit home was when Natsume lost the picture of his parents. Being shy myself, I could really relate to him there and how he tried to hide all of his problems out of fear of getting too much in their way. Heck, I’ll just say it: this was the best episode of the entire season. This is exactly what I’ve been waiting for.
Rating: **** (Fantastic)

Natsume Yuujin-Chou – 49

by psgels, posted in Natsume Yuujin-Chou

This show is such a troll. First it promises a Reiko episode, only to be about something completely different. And now it turns out that the hints for Matoba being involved again also are false and instead some random exorcist was the one who sealed off Houdzuki. I can understand why this is done though: the fourth season is really dedicated to expanding the world of Natsume Yuujin-chou. It’s episodes like this that show that this series isn’t just about the main characters and that they live in a very expansive world.

In this episode, Natsume really pushed himself to his limits. Physically, at least, to the point of exhaustion. Where the third season focused more on his growth as a character, in the fourth season he seems much more scared of something bad happening and puts in much more effort to prevent that from happening. I also loved Nyanko-sensei in this episode Where I previously complained that he was a bit repetitively getting removed from the plot, here he was an active part of it. I especially loved how a the end of the episode, he got back at Natsume for abusing him so much in his rush to solve things.

Now, I also am going to have to be a bit negative, though. The fourth season had the best opening episodes of all four Natsume seasons, but after that things changed a bit. In particular, there has not been a stand-out episode like the Hotaru episode or the episode where Natsume meets Touko. ?The past episodes were still really good and among the best of the season, but for Natsume Yuujin-chou’s standards, they were missing something. That little edge in storytelling that makes you leave episodes with a heart-warming feeling.

The third season would have been a great point to actually end the series. The manga was incomplete, but that incredibly heart-warming ending was awesome and well built up. The fourth season though, is building up for something that still needs to arrive. It’s fleshing out the world of Natsume Yuujin-chou for awesome stuff, but with these kinds of things it’s always a matter of hoping that the producers will green-light a fifth season, a treatment that only the most popular series or shounen fighting shows manage to acquire. The thing is also: the more episodes that this show takes, the harder it becomes to recommend it.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Natsume Yuujin-Chou – 48

by psgels, posted in Natsume Yuujin-Chou

And we’re into another two-part arc for this series. This one is focused on Hiiragi and Natori, with a few hints that Matoba is involved as well.

The focus on this episode was about Natori actually having to seal away a god, rather than a youkai as he gets a very strange request to do all this within one day. I think this was the first time in which we’ve seen him uncomfortable.

Natsume in the meantime is of pretending to be the opposite of said god, and with this he seems to ignore one thing that I find rather strange: his smell. In the past he has been very often sniffed out as a human when he tried to dress up. I find it weird that he still doesn’t seem to have learned after all that.

Also, someone mentioned it in the comments last week, but with this episode it again caught my attention: the creators are having trouble to separate Natsume and Nyanko. In this episode Nyanko wanders off and something happens to Natsume. After that Nyanko accidentally gets touched by one of Natori’s exorcist-thingies, and afterwards something again happens to Natsume. As much as I like this series, it is starting to get a little repetitive this way.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Natsume Yuujin-Chou – 47

by psgels, posted in Natsume Yuujin-Chou

I think that this was one of the least charming episode of the fourth season so far, but that’s like going to a four-star restaurant and ordering the cheapest dish: it’s still delicious!

Right from out of nowhere did we get a background episode on that old lady who kept accompanying Matoba. With this, we finally get to know her and who she is, by telling a story about her past. And screw this episode for teasing so much with Reiko! The start of this episode really made it seem like the two actually met each other, but instead Reiko stole the name of a youkai who happened to have left a large impression on the woman.

And again, this show used the past and present wonderfully to fold out, and the start of the episode was once again hilarious. I’m not sure why it didn’t hit me as much as the other episodes, but that probably is due to the calculating nature of the woman: It’s hard to explain, but at the very least she turned into a much more interesting character in this episode.

Also, the animators. They were very clearly inspired by Ghibli this episode. That one youkai’s animation: that was really good, even for this series’ standards.
Rating: ** (Excellent)