Category: Finished Series: Slice of Life/Drama

Natsume Yuujin-Chou – 26

by psgels, posted in Natsume Yuujin-Chou



Short Synopsis: Natsume finds himself having to choose between Kai and Natori.
Episode Rating: 7,5/10 (Good)
Well, the creators did it, even though they had to stuff two chapters into only one episode. It makes a lot of sense to save this story for last, because it really forms a conclusion to the development of Natsume throughout the second season: for once, he’s being forced to choose between humans and youkai.

I also liked that little scene at the end, which symbolizes how much closer Natsume has gotten to his classmates now. It’s time for the guy to grow up and stop only interacting with youkai. It was a very nice idea for an ending, and while not the best ending I’ve seen this season, it was definitely a good one; something that most other shows this season can’t boast.

Overall, the second season wasn’t exactly among my favourites, but it was nevertheless enjoyable to watch and the character-development on Natsume was very nicely done. Let’s hope that there’s going to be a third season some day.

Natsume Yuujinchou – 25

by psgels, posted in Natsume Yuujin-Chou



Short Synopsis: Natsume meets a strange boy locked inside a trunk inside a strange house.
Episode Rating: 7,5/10 (Good)
I really have no idea what the creators are thinking, trying to stuff the contents of two chapters into one single episode. In fact, if the final episode of the first season would have simply been a story that we saw in the second season, then we wouldn’t have had this problem in the first place, since then the creators would have had enough time for that final arc of this series.

But yeah, I still liked this episode. It especially showed the subtle character-development. For the first time, Natsume is embarrassed in front of his friends by a stupid joke, and for the first time he gets ticked off when they’re laughing. Especially Kaname’s role in this series is quite unique and in a way pretty realistic: the two of them are good friends, but because they’re both loners and prefer being alone, you only see them together every once in a while. That doesn’t mean, however, that I’d really like to see an episode focused on getting to know his character a bit more. ^^;

In any case, about the episode, that kid intrigues me: here we have a youkai, who was sealed inside a wooden trunk for who knows how long, and yet people can see him, he doesn’t seem to notice that he’s a youkai himself, and he even seems to have friends at school who never suspected anything. The key seems to be in a promise he made with a weird axe-wielding youkai, that that kid failed to keep. My guess would be that he wanted to get a human body, but at the cost of a very high price. But then again, I doubt that such a relatively weak-looking youkai would be able to do such a thing.

Michiko e Hatchin Review – 92,5/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews, Michiko e Hatchin



Ah, time to review one of my favourites of the past season. Manglobe always manages to come with some fun, interesting and innovative series, and this one’s no different. While Samurai Champloo had its action, Ergo Proxy had its plot, Michiko e Hatchin stands out in its characters. But like the other two, it really has so much more to like about it.

I often criticise anime for taking place too much in Japan, while there are much more interesting sites in the world to explore. This series does that exactly, giving an incredibly accurate portrayal of Brazil in the 1980s to work with. From the police driving in beetles to the busy cities, everything just screams “Brazil” throughout the entire series. The only other series that I can think of that play out somewhere in south America are more than twenty-five years old by now.

And like mentioned above: the characters are the true highlight of this series. While at first this seems like your average strong character travels together with weak character, it soon becomes clear that the relationship between Michiko and Hatchin is much, much different. Michiko is a sleezebag, she constantly causes trouble and knows nothing about raising children. Hatchin is neat, tidy and ordered, but hates laziness with passion. The personalities between the two constantly clash, and it actually takes a very, very long time for the two of them to get used to each other, but when they do, they really complement their own weaknesses. Especially Hatchin grows into an awesome character, who is constantly fun to watch.

This series can also boast one of the best villains out there in a long, long time. Satoshi doesn’t appear on the screen a lot, but when he does, you instantly know that this guy is incredibly dangerous, and yet at the same time he stands so far away from your standard “Muaha, I’m going to destroy the world because I’m evil!” that you seem to see in nearly every anime nowadays.

What also made this into such a great show is that it’s incredibly varied. It’s a show with many different faces, rather than just one general tone that keeps up for the entire series. One episode may be fun and full of comedy, while the next is an incredibly dark one about the inner clashes of street gangs, while the next may turn into a fun action-game sequence. You’ll never know what the series is going to focus on next, but it’s always going to be fresh and interesting.

Right now, I’m trying to think of a big flaw in this series, but all I can think of is some tiny flaws, like how for some characters the introduction seems to be missing, so you’re often thrown into the blue, or how the ending doesn’t answer all of the questions that you might have gathered through the series, but those are just mere details.

The thing is, that Michiko e Hatchin is an awesome, stylish and mature series and it excels at just about everything that it does. There is a fantastic dynamic between the characters, and never once does it feel childish or anything, despite Hatchin being a 10 year old and all. It’s really got a bit of everything, and it’s my personal favourite series of a studio that had already a record of putting down the most amazing series.

Storytelling: 9/10
Characters: 10/10
Production-Values: 9/10
Setting: 9/10

Michiko e Hatchin – 22

by psgels, posted in Michiko e Hatchin



Short Synopsis: It’s time for Hiroshi to make his appearance.
Episode Rating: 8/10 (Excellent)
And so it has ended. The ending was good, and in a way it was the only ending that would have made sense. I really like how the creators didn’t try to stuff too much into this episode, but also saved enough for this episode to happen. the whole gang wars and Satoshi storyline all ended in the previous episode, and this episode was just about Hatchin, Hiroshi, Michiko and the police. The creators could have kept Satoshi alive in order to create some chaotic ending, or like Samurai Champloo, they could have saved him for the big fight, like with Samurai Champloo, but this ending was very focused, and indeed served very clearly its purpose.

So yeah, while it would have been nice for Michiko, Hiroshi and Hatchin to live happily ever after, that just isn’t realistic. Michiko is wanted by the police. It just isn’t realistic for her to raise a child while she constantly has to look out for the police, and the only reason why she took the huge gamble of busting jail and running away from the police was to let Hatchin meet her father. Even though she definitely wanted to see Hiroshi back, and probably still loves him, she knew all along that she’d be returning to jail when she ended up meeting the guy, and Atsuko saw that as well.

And then of course it would have been nice for Hatchin to grow up along with her father in Mexico, but the dude ran away for a reason. There’s no way that he’s suddenly going to have a change of heart. He indeed quickly left Hatchin to chase after another woman. I didn’t quite catch where Hatchin’s kid came from, but that’s not really important for the story. In any case, Hatchin renames herself back to Hana and starts working quietly as a restaurant’s cook for a bunch of years, to wait for Michiko to sit out her time in jail. And so, when the latter gets released for real, she of course immediately heads to where Hatchin ended up living (she probably knew this because Hiroshi left her the address). Oh, and grown up Hatchin looks awesome, by the way.

The only disappointment with this ending really was that we never knew who exactly was Hatchin’s mother. Sure we also don’t know exactly what happened during Hiroshi’s bus accident, but we don’t need to: he clearly faked his own death in order to run away from the likes of Satoshi and the other gang members he got on bad terms with, but I’d love to have seen Hatchin’s mother, though that would probably be one of the countless women Hiroshi hung out with, only to dump afterwards after making her get the wing tattoo.

I don’t think that this is going to be one of the best endings of the season, though it is probably going to be the most realistic one. And furthermore, the rest of this series definitely has been one of the most enjoyable ones out of the ones currently airing, apart from Birdy the Mighty. It was definitely fun blogging this series (and fanboying about Hatchin), and I’m looking forward to about two years from now, in which we get to see Manglobe’s next epic.

Natsume Yuujin-Chou – 24

by psgels, posted in Natsume Yuujin-Chou



Short Synopsis: Natori returns and needs Natsume’s powers once again.
Episode Rating: 7,5/10 (Good)
Okay, so while this series hasn’t been my favourite of the past season, I’d love to see a third season introduced one of these days. The second season was also announced around this time in the first season, so let’s hope that the creators aren’t planning to end this just yet with only 26 episodes. There’s lots of potential left in this one, although on the other hand, it’s also going to be interesting to see what Brains Base can do when they start working on a completely new and different series. It’s a shame that these small yet very good companies as Brains Base, Manglobe and Bee-Train (well, at least I consider them very good) can only release one or two series every year, because it’s always interesting to see what they can come up with next.

One thing I didn’t like in this episode was how Natsume turns out to have huge mysterious powers. I’d hoped that this series would avoid this cliche, but I guess that it’s going to be important for later story arcs, if they ever get to be animated. The subject of this episode was an interesting one, though. Natsume finally gets the chance to attend a sort-of “people who can see youkai”-convention. In this, he hopes to see other people who are the same as him, but that really was the wrong kind of place he should have tried to look for.

Most of the people in the convention were simply looking for business, and came from close-knit families in which it was normal to see and use youkai. It really seems that seeing Youkai runs down your family. These families have mostly strong values of traditions, and so their values are easily passed down from generation to generation, without much influence from outsiders who can’t see them. It actually turns out that Natsume is a minority in his suffering because he grew up alone, thanks to Reiko who most likely never wanted to have to do anything with those pesky family values, despite having huge powers. My guess would be that she was the daughter of a powerful and influential family of people who can see youkai, which fell apart at some point.

The final two episodes seem to belong to a big arc, which finally does resemble a real climax, rather than the unconventional yet anticlimactic ending of the first season. Let’s hope that the creators do succeed in combining three chapters in only two episodes, but a bit of a clever cut-job should be able to do it.

Michiko e Hatchin – 21

by psgels, posted in Michiko e Hatchin



Short Synopsis: Michiko tries to find Hatchin as she’s chased by the police.
Episode Rating: 8,5/10 (Awesome)
Oh, how I love this series. Why must there be only one episode left!?

In any case, this episode was very much about the dark side of Michiko e Hatchin as it prepared for the final episode… and finishes off Satoshi’s storyline. I must say that his time together with Hatchin made a lot of impact on me. Hatchin is such an awesome damsel in distress: while she pretty much got dragged along by Satoshi, she constantly tried to argue with him and run away. Even going as far as trying to throw rocks at the guy when he had his gun pointed at her.

Satoshi’s end was… amazing, but not in the usual way. His development in the end was so incredibly subtle. There was no “zomg look here I did something nice for a change”. She came to him at a time in which he was in trouble and alone as well, there was just his time hanging out with Hatchin, his constant arguing with her, and this one line in which he acknowledged her (when she tried to throw that rock to him). With that, his sacrifice made perfect sense. Anime has a bad track record of making bad-ass punks like him turn soft in an overly cheesy way, but there was no cheese whatsoever in Satoshi’s death. His demise was brutal, there was no crying, overacted sadness or anything. Just a couple of smiling punks that grinned as they finished him off. It’s been a while since I’ve seen such a cold death from one of my favourite characters.

The past two episodes were really about the Hatchin vs. Satoshi, but at the same time Michiko did enough to keep her side of the story busy. Hatchin really has a lot of influence on the people she meets, and the creators did such a wonderful job on making this assumable. Michiko, a woman who is supposed to be on the run instead of hiding focuses on trying to get Hatchin back, throwing herself onto the lions. We’ve seen thus far that the police are not exactly perfect in this series but you don’t want to be walking right into them or you’ll be screwed.

The new policemen also felt like they were supposed to be introduced at this point, not like Samurai Champloo which needed a bunch of villains for its action-packed finale. And oh boy, speaking of which: I was so sure that the creators were going to wait till the next episode to show Hiroshi, and yet the bugger already popped up right now.

The next episode… it really promises to become an amazing one. I love endings which don’t revolve around two extremely powerful people going at it against each other (after all, it’s just too predictable, we’ve seen those things many times before), and in the end it’s going to be a combination of a cat-and-mouse game with the police and that loser of a Hiroshi trying to justify himself in front of his daughter. The interesting thing is of course going to be that Hatchin really doesn’t care about whether she can meet her father or not, but she is essentially trying to find him for Michiko. With Fuu, her journey was pretty much over when she met her father, but for Michiko and Hatchin, there’s a whole more dimension between them and Hiroshi.

At this point, I’d definitely label this series at the top of the season, even above Casshern Sins which in the end didn’t live up to its expectations. Michiko e Hatchin more than did, and I’m SO looking forward to that final episode, and at the same time I’d just wish it were longer. You can pretty much consider me a Manglobe-fanboy at this point. Samurai Champloo and Ergo Proxy already were incredibly good, but Michiko e Hatchin far surpassed them.

Natsume Yuujin-Chou – 23

by psgels, posted in Natsume Yuujin-Chou



Short Synopsis: Natsume’s foster father tells him about Reiko.
Episode Rating: 8,5/10 (Awesome)
Okay, so I’ve had my share of problems with the second season so far, but this episode was without a doubt the best episode of Zoku Natsume Yuujinchou, and not just because of the strange change in animation style (which did help, though). This episode really was everything that makes this such a good series, and FINALLY we get some more background on Reiko!

I think that one of the reasons why we’ve seen so little of Natsume’s friends and family is that he hardly ever hangs out with them. This episode felt like the first time he spent some quality time with his foster father (or however that’s called, I think his name was Shigire), and after all this time, he’s still having trouble to fit in. When at the end of the episode, he destroys his own room, seeing Shigire accept everything that happened, including Natsume’s very bad attempt at lying, it felt like Natsume had grown much, much closer to his family.

And I’m not sure who exactly was responsible for the animation in this episode, but it looked really good. At the expense of a bit of detail, there was lots of movement, and this worked especially well with the Youkai that appeared in this episode, especially when it tried to eat Natsume. That one would have failed completely if it was just handled with the regular animation of this series.

It also was very interesting to see Reiko from the perspective of someone who can’t see Youkai. When Shigire met her, she really looked like a strange girl who talked to trees, instead of the manipulative yet good-hearted girl that we’ve come to know her as. The choice for the boy’s voice actor also was a strange one: he nearly continuously screaming, but I guess that that’s where the realism comes in: real boys his age also tend to scream and yell when they get worked up.

Michiko e Hatchin – 20

by psgels, posted in Michiko e Hatchin



Short Synopsis: Satoshi vs Shinsuke.
Episode Rating: 8,5/10 (Awesome)
Awesome! Awesome! Awesome! Awesome! This series already was one of my favourites of the currently airing shows, and in the past two episodes it really surpassed itself! While for Casshern Sins I wasn’t sure whether everything would come together in the end, I can be sure for Michiko e Hatchin: it’s going to have an awesome finale! There are so many trumps that it hasn’t played yet, and yet it feels like they can perfectly fit within the final two episodes of this show. At this point, I can say that Michiko e Hatchin has been Manglobe’s best work: Ergo Proxy had pacing issues and Samurai Champloo was a bit meager on its overall storyline, but this time it feels like they’ve done a job without any major flaws. Not to mention that it’s been incredibly fun so far.

This episode really surprised me when it Satoshi took care of Shinsuke and his gang. Especially the way he used his head to completely screw over all of his attackers was awesome, and now he ended up killing someone he grew up with. He originally was portrayed as a heartless bastard, but I really liked it how he did show emotion when he was about to kill Shinsuke. And again we see Michiko and Hatchin split up for more than one episode. Michiko’s parts were also pretty intense.

This series really has something I’ve been looking for a long time now. I think the last series I watched that had it was Shion no Ou: call it the X-factor. Characters that can be awesome no matter what they do. It’s really one of the reasons why I’m still so much into anime. The nicely written series are a nice way to spend time, but the really special series like this one are especially the ones that make it worth it. This is of course something incredibly subjective, but for me this series has been an awesome ride.

Michiko e Hatchin – 19

by psgels, posted in Michiko e Hatchin



Short Synopsis: A trainwreck. Literally!
Episode Rating: 9/10 (fantastic)
Haha! So what if the animation style was completely different from the rest of the series?! This most likely was one of the best episodes of Michiko e Hatchin yet! It’s really awesome that everything is now coming together more than ever. I really have to say that Manglobe did a fantastic job on this episode, and I can only hope that the rest of the series’ finale is going to be as awesome as this!

And MAN! Satoshi seriously is the best villain I’ve seen in a long, long while, and that considering how relatively little airtime he has gotten in the series! Every time he appears, you just know that he’s going to do something evil, and yet he stands so far above 99% of all those “Muaha I’m going to destroy the world because I’m evil!!1!”-villains. This episode makes it even better when it unites the two best characters of this series: Hatchin and Satoshi, with awesome results.

And in the meantime Atsuko pays a visit to Michiko. Ah, so what if it’s forced and directed, it was damn awesome as well: we finally get some real insight into Atsuko’s character. Even when Michiko served in jail, she just kept running after her like a shadow, but in the end she values her as a friend and really intends to help her escape, although this would mean that she’d have to abandon Hiroshi and Hatchin for it. And yet again, Michiko ignores her requests. It turns out that what she wants more than anything else isn’t revenge on Michiko, but instead acknowledgement. She wants Michiko to see her as an equal, and she just keeps failing at it.

And yeah, the animation was screwed up, but nevertheless it looked GREAT. There was lots of movement and interesting camera-angles, perhaps at the expense of a Hatchin that looked less cute than usual. At times like these, I’m grateful for this series’ really weird broadcasting policy: I can hardly wait for that next episode!

Natsume Yuujin-Chou – 22

by psgels, posted in Natsume Yuujin-Chou



Short Synopsis: Natsume buys a picture and wakes up next to flower blossoms.
Episode Rating: 8/10 (Excellent)
Aha! I finally see the big difference in how I’ve been enjoying the first season when compared to the second season. Those who have read my past entries probably know that for some reason, the second season didn’t hit me as hard as the first season did. My guess that the novelty of the storytelling started to wear off, while the first season had me especially in its first half at the edge of my seat, I didn’t experience this with the second one, but now I realize that its episode in exchange felt really satisfying when they ended. Especially this episode: throughout the episode it didn’t feel like anything special, but in the end it felt like everything came together perfectly.

And seriously, Natsume is just TOO nice at times. He buys a picture, it starts sucking the life out of him and yet he refuses to have it removed because it supposedly contains a special person to a youkai he just met days before. As it turns out, the youkai and that person had met centuries ago. At one point, the guy stopped showing up (probably because he died since his health was weak), and instead of waiting for a quarter of an eternity like most Youkai would, Mai (the youkai) instead starts looking for him, and eventually seems to have found him inside that picture. Ever since, she’s been travelling with that picture, even though the guy could never say anything back, or even confirm that he indeed was the one that she made friends with.

And this episode shows again the meaning of masks in this series: breaking them seems to signify being able to move forward and change. In this case, Mai’s hard patience finally paid off when she could meet her loved one again. And I guess that that all happened because of the sacrifice Natsume made for him, but god, he could easily have died if he chose the wrong painting to be nice to.

This episode also had a very short bit about Natsume and his mother. It established that Natsume still has trouble to fully trust his mother, simply because he has a secret that she’s never going to believe him for. It was mostly building up in this episode, but I wonder if the chapters in which this building up is used can still make it within the series.