Category: Anime Reviews

Ouran is a high-school comedy-drama with a twist: the school this anime takes place in is only for the children of the richest parents in Japan. It’s meant for those children who are able to spend a huge amount of money. The only way for non-rich people to get in the school is to have exceptionally good grades.

Well then, for some reason, rich people don’t have to do any homework, so they huge amounts of time to spend. This anime is about the Host Club of this school. It’s basically a way for the rich people to spend their time. The club consists out of a group of bishounen, who all entertain the ladies who come to the host club. Then, a female, pretending to be a male joins the club, and the anime starts.

Ouran’s strength is its novelty. The bad thing is that it doesn’t seem to realize this. I’m afraid to say it, but most of the episodes, this anime just keeps milking on old concepts they already tried, up to the point at which things just become incredibly boring. An example of this is our main character’s sarcasm. When this gets used in the first episode, it’s funny. Same in the second episode. But when she reacts the same way in over twenty episodes, the fun quickly dies. It’s a darn shame, as the episodes which introduce new things really worked out. Both in comedy as in drama.

You can really see this in the episodes in which one or two particular characters stand in the spotlights. All these episodes basically to is retell things from other episodes, only a bit changed and twisted in order to make them look unique. It’s also strange that the annoying characters get three or four episodes for themselves, while another character doesn’t get even half of an episode. Still, this made the latter one of the better characters.

Still, I have to admit, in terms of character development, the characters of Ouran are very fleshed out. The episodes do give characters the chance of showing their unique cases, and later in the series, you can spot the changes. While this does look boring the moment when you see it, the overall picture that this gives is impressive.

Like I said, some of the characters are unique. Others, however, do not fit in this anime. The image of a small, cute, cuddly child who happens to be the strongest master of martial arts on the planet was just too forced. I also didn’t like the fact that being the richest also automatically means being the strongest, smartest, best, or any other superior element. The creators also didn’t really attempt to deviate from this, apart from having a main character who’s poor. But even then there’s no emphasis put on this, which is a shame, as it’s an interesting subject.

Overall, Ouran did have its very good moments. Some episodes were just hilarious. It’s just too bad that these good episodes were surrounded by bad episodes. Still, it remains a fairly good comedy, and the drama aspects were fine. It’ll be a fine watch, although boring at times.

Blood+ is a 50-episode action drama. It follows the battle between two vampire-like girls: Saya and Diva. It’s a rather epic tale, Diva is almost the equal of a killing machine, and Saya made it her life-goal to kill her once and for all. They both have their own allies, Saya has the friends she spent happy times with, while Diva turned a number of people in monsters, making them completely devoted to each her.

This anime definitely is worth watching. The episodes 26-36 are so incredibly good. They even had me crying at times, which does not happen often. The first half of the series, or episodes 1 to 25 are interesting to watch, though they might be a pain to get through due to their huge length. They do, however, build up perfectly for the sheer awesomeness that follows afterwards.

Though I’m afraid I have to say it, but after episode 36, the overall quality of the anime gradually drops. From that point, it’s like a straight line to the finish. There are some entertaining moments, but it’s clear that the creators already played all of their trump cards in episodes 26-36. Still, it does remain enjoyable. My complaint, however, is the last two episodes, in which the series ends. They really work anticlimactic, as they somehow manage to destroy everything the series has been building up for.

The characters are very enjoyable to watch. As this anime has 50 episodes, there are lots of opportunities to really flesh out each of the characters, and the creators gave a very good attempt in doing so. The character development in this anime really worked out. The characters are also very interesting to watch in all of their struggles. Whenever an important character dies, (that does happen at certain points in this anime) the effects this has are great to see. Except, perhaps, when the ending comes near. By that time, these deaths become rather predictable.

As this is an action-series, be sure to expect lots of battles. The creators also made sure that our heroine Saya stayed alive through all this by giving her the ability to regenerate her wounds, so that if she’s slashed once, she isn’t really killed. Even though I can see why the creators chose to do this, I find it also a bit weak. The battles themselves also don’t really try to be original, or something. While they are exciting, they’re nothing special. Still, the normal humans do not have the ability to regenerate. The battles in which humans play a role are mostly the most creative ones.

In terms of music, this anime also tries to be epic. At some times, it really works, but when you compare it to other anime, then the soundtrack of Blood+ isn’t really anything special. It doesn’t really try to stand out. Same with the graphics. They’re good, they really work, but they don’t try to stand out. Only Lewis and the Schiff ended up with memorable character designs.

Overall, Blood+ really is a series with its ups and downs. It’s got some totally amazing moments, but at the same time, some elements are doomed for mediocrity. Still, the awesome moments were definitely worth it.

You don’t often her people talk about Ningyo no Mori, or Mermaid’s Forest. It’s a shame, as it’s pretty darn awesome. You could call it a mystery romance with lots of morals and ethics, though it’s way more than just that.

Ningyo no Mori has chosen an extremely strong theme to be centred around: immortality. You can do so many fun things with it. The case is like this: there’s a legend about mermaids. Whenever you eat their flesh, you have the chance of becoming an immortal being. Still, only once every century someone manages to actually become a true immortal. Most people become disfigured, berserked humans, destined to spend the rest of their lives in agony. The story focuses at two people, who did manage to become immortal (after all, you wouldn’t have much of a story if they didn’t, right? ;)). One has been roaming around for 500 years, until he met up with the other, who had just been fed some mermaid’s flesh, in order to become food for the mermaids themselves (watch the show in order to know the reason for this. ;)). Right now, they’re travelling the world, in order to find a cure for their immortality.

With this concept, the show is able to do some amazing things. It consists out of a number of arcs, each focusing at a human who had some kind of experience with either a mermaid, or mermaid’s flesh. Each and every one of those arcs manages to drive to the boundaries of right and wrong, with amazing results. The fact is that being immortal isn’t that fun, and certain people become obsessed over the mermaid’s flesh, without even knowing that most people just get turned into hideous monsters for the rest of their lives. This anime really is excellent in toying with morals, ethics and most importantly, human lives. Most often, we run into people who have been suffering from the direct or indirect effects from the mermaid’s flesh for over 40, 50 or 60 years. One extreme case even lived as long as 800 years!

I have to say that each and every one of the cases, introduced in the different arcs were just awesome to see. They really belonged in the category of incredibly unique stories. Each episode, plot twists happen which you SO wouldn’t expect, only making each of these stories better and better. My favourite arc remains the one with the face-changing woman. So many original concepts are used.

And I haven’t even started about the art yet. Even though the characters look rather blend at first sight, the creators do know how to make characters scary. Evil characters are portrayed in such an amazing way, and during the climaxes of the show, the art really contributes to the overall feeling. The creators also came up with an extremely fitting soundtrack. By itself, it isn’t really special, but somehow, it really fits with the overall themes of this show.

Still, there’s one bad thing about this anime. The ending is rather anticlimactic, and left me with a rather bad feeling. Nothing really is resolved in the end, it’s really like some kind of open ending.

Overall, I really recommend this anime. It’s only 13 episodes, so it’s perfect if you have a bit of spare time. Especially if you like shows that really toy with human lives, it’s worth to check this one out. I greatly enjoyed watching it. ^^

Binbou Shimai Monogatari is your typical slice-of-life series. Kyou and Asu are two sisters. Their mother died when Asu was born, while their father ran away and left a huge debt. This means that they’ve been living most of their lives together. And that’s basically it. The ten episodes of this anime basically follow these two girls, as they live their daily life.

While it definitely isn’t anything special, I have to give this series credit for being the first slice-of-life show to actually catch my interest. The fact that the girls are alone didn’t only make them independent, it also made them very emotional towards each other. The two girls love each other, but at the same time, they worry about each other way too much, which makes sure for a couple of very cute scenes.

The anime certainly has a few very cute moments. There are some light attempts at comedy which really contribute to these scenes. It’s also one of the few series in which the different eye-catches are very amusing. The character designs look very good, and both sisters look very cute. Still, the fact remains that this is a slice-of-life series. During the majority of the airtime, it’s just boring. It also contains a couple of moments which don’t really make any sense, with the most notable one being an extremely rich girl who insists on buying all kinds of bargains.

Overall, it had its cute moments, but Binbou Shimai Monogatari will never be anything memorable. Only check out this series if you are really, really bored.

You hear a lot of things about Narutaru. It’s supposed to be sick, disgusting and disturbing. I decided to check this out for myself, and I actually found that these supposedly “horrific scenes” were pretty awesome. I can really say that I enjoyed this anime. It’s not perfect though, but I’ll get to that later.

The story: while on holiday at her grandparents’, Shiina runs into a strange star-shaped animal, with some very strange powers. When she returns, it becomes clear that there’ve been more children who ran into similar creatures. A majority of these children are alienated from society. When the anime progresses, it becomes clear that some of these children use their creature in order to kill others.

The story starts out very light-hearted, and turns darker as the episodes progress, and so does the level of disturbing material. At episode eight, the first major climax of the anime arrives. Afterwards, the story suddenly takes a huge leap towards a totally different focus. This continues up to the thirteenth episode, which finishes the series with a great ending.

The thing I love about this anime is the huge number of disturbing footage which is shown. And especially the reaction this has on the different characters. Seeing that most of the characters are just young kids, the shock of experiencing those kinds of things becomes huge, and Narutaru does a very fine job in portraying this. Whether the characters get angry, sad, or scared, all of this was portrayed in a really awesome way. I can really say that I had a great time watching this anime. Especially the episodes with lots of pain and suffering were awesome.

Still, the fact remains that Narutaru is an anime which could easily have been expanded to 24 or 26 episodes. It definitely has enough material for this, and it would have made this series a lot better. That’s because right now, the creators had to stuff this series into only 13 episodes. Some anime try this by having a huge pacing. Narutaru tried this by just omitting a lot of scenes. The result is that it introduces lots of questions, but only focuses at a select few of them, ignoring all of the others, leaving them entirely unanswered. For example, we see one of the bad guys preparing for some kind of plan, but then he suddenly entirely disappears from the screen. We never see any trace of him. And there are many more examples like these. Still, the points at which Narutaru did decide to focus on worked out great. ^^

Overall, it’s a very nice anime. If you like disturbing anime, you seriously should consider to check this one out. I had a great time watching this. It’s just that I wish there was more of it.

After Mind Game, it seemed a good opportunity to check out another infamously absurd movie: Dead Leaves. It’s interesting to compare the two of them. Both movies are as far away from normal as possible, both are just crazy, both have their own good points, and both have their own bad points.

Let me issue a warning before I continue: Dead Leaves is absolutely not meant for little children. It can and will have a bad influence on them. The entire movie basically is a senseless violence-fest, with lots of maniacal gunfights and explosions whose purpose seems only to entertain the viewer. There’s also a huge dose of foul language in this, so keep this away from your little brother and sister.

One of the most notable differences between Mind Game and Dead Leaves was the fact that while Mind Game had its moment in which the pacing was very slow, Dead Leaves absolutely does NOT have these. The pacing is huge from beginning to end. Especially if you combine this with a couple of hyperactive characters, you’re in for a huge roller-coaster ride.

The story’s like this. A man and women wake up somewhere, unable to remember anything. They’re naked and decide to rob a store, with lots of violence and gunfights. After a huge car chase, they get caught by the police and end up in a mutant prison on the moon. In there, they discover that in this prison, pretty gruesome things happen. Over the course of the anime, some pretty interesting plot twists occur. Overall, it’s a pretty creative story. The main characters are an interesting bunch. We have a hyperactive man with a television as head and a very tough, sarcastic woman. They really are very funny at times. There wasn’t really any point at which I found them annoying.

Still, Dead Leaves does have its bad points. Unlike Mind Game it has some predictable points. Okay, some events are impossible to predict, but during some scenes, you only have to wait for the inevitable to happen. The character art also differs from normal anime. It’s a bit messy. It looks interesting at times, some characters have really creative designs (the television guy, some of the goons. These really looked evil when they wanted to). Other characters, however, look just plain. Another strange thing I noticed was that near the end, the overall animation quality suddenly got bogged down.

The major bad part of Dead Leaves was its infinite amount of action. Gunfights can be very entertaining at times, though a series has to know its limits. Dead Leaves doesn’t. Most of the times, we see people shooting as much bullets at each other until one of them dies. After the twentieth time, this gets rather annoying. The mindless killing also really got on my nerves at times, as they didn’t really add anything new.

Overall, like Mind Game, dead leaves was a very nice watch at times. Some scenes were very creative and amusing to see. Other scenes, however, ruined the movie a bit. Still, if you’re some kind of action or foul language junk, you’ll probably love this.

Mind Game has been on my to-watch list for quite some time now, as it was both produced by Studio 4C and I heard good recommendations about it. Well, now that I’ve seen it, what do I get? Well… good question!

I’m not sure how to describe Mind Game. The closest I can think of is Robinson Crusoë who’s been smoking dangerous stuff. This really is one of the more absurd movies I’ve seen. Even Eikyuu Kazoku seems like an ordinary walk in terms of strangeness. We’ve got a guy, who’s much like a loser. He’s got a girl he likes, he confessed to her, though he keeps getting too scared to take initiative. Until she gets a new boyfriend. So far it’s normal, though this is where every possible connection with the word “normal” ends. The main character, the girl and her new boyfriend sit the restaurant of the girl’s family. A very dangerous guy comes in and starts causing trouble. He then sees our main character, who can’t move out of fear, and he kills him.

Our main character then has a talk with god, after which he starts to freak out because of his own foolish mistakes. He runs away from god and turns back to life. In there, he kills the guy who killed him and runs away with the girl and her sister. In the end, they end up in the belly of a huge whale, along with a strange old man. That’s where most of the story takes place, believe it or not.

I’ve got a hate/love relationship with this absurdness. On one side, there are times at which it really works. We get to see a very creative car chase, and the characters work good with all of the chaos which bursts out of nowhere. At other times, however, the show gets a bit annoying. We often get to see useless fanservice, and some chaotic scenes drag on for a bit too long. I believe that this movie could’ve been more successful if it had been trimmed down to the length of one hour, instead of the 1 hour and 40 minutes it has now.

The graphics are again drawn in the typical style of Studio 4C. Still, for some reason, it didn’t really appeal to me in the way Mahou Shoujotai, Eikyuu Kazoku, Beyond and Comedy did. The animation, then again, shows that this is a big budgeted movie. Overall, it looks pretty creative and fluid. Something you can expect of a normal movie. The background art, however, is where this movie does excel. Things look as creative as ever, though Studio 4C has always been excellent in this department.

Overall, it was a nice watch, but it was definitely not Studio 4C’s best work. I’m suggesting you to check out Mahou Shoujotai, Eikyuu Kazoku and Comedy if you are trying to see some of their stuff. Still, I have to admit. The beginning of the movie, aka before they got into the whale’s belly was worth the watch.

Interlude is a dating-sim mystery anime. It’s an OVA, containing three episodes. It’s really one of these anime you need to think about in order to fully understand it. We’ve got our main character, living his everyday life. Until he meets a strange girl, alone at the station. Starting from that moment, he’ll learn that something huge went on in the past. Especially the first half is covered with small flashes in which our main character, along with his girlfriend lie mortally wounded next to each other, which is enough to keep you excited.

The mystery-part definitely was worth it. Especially in the first episode, when nothing is revealed yet. The background story slowly gets unravelled, and it’s full of creativity. In just three episodes, the storyline gets told, revealing a bit more every time. I have to say, though, regarding the flashes mentioned above. When their meaning gets revealed, it sortof lacks impact. It’s the case with most other revelations as well. Together, these revelations form a great concept, but individually, they aren’t really that exciting.

When the anime turns to the dating-sim-part, however, it goes nowhere fast. In a bad way. A large part of the second episode just consists out of our main character, trying to hit on a girl, and the first and third episode also contain rather boring romance scenes which didn’t really move me in any way. The creators also somehow found it a nice idea to throw in lots of useless fanservice, which didn’t really do this anime any good.

The characters themselves, however, are a major plus in this OVA, though not in the way you’d expect it. I have to admit, while watching the third episode, they became a bit annoying at times. But when the episode was over, and I began to think about the characters a bit (especially the side-characters), only then I realized what they’ve gone through. Only then I realized the horrors they experienced. That’s the strength these characters have. Especially Tama got my respect at that point. Still, this effect could have been bigger if some unanswered questions were answered. Some things just are never explained, which sortof hurts this OVA.

The character art used in this anime is most of the times very high-quality. Most of the characters have interesting character designs. The creators also liked to play with lighting effects, which gives an interesting result. Still, I’ve got one complaint. The main character just looks ugly.

Overall, I’m glad I’ve seen Interlude. It was a very interesting watch, which really requires you to think in order to fully enjoy it. A good example of an anime which has more than just what we see on the surface. Still, it could have been much better executed at certain points.

Seriously. I’ve seen Comedy for ten times now already, and I’m still drooling. This ten-minute short by Studio 4C really is a piece of beautiful art. Not just the drawings and background, but the story and the characters themselves as well.

Just for the record, it may be named Comedy, but the short itself is everything but a comedy. It’s a story, set in Ireland in the middle ages. The English are about to invade a village, and one of the villagers, a five year old girl, searches for a black swordsman in order to defend the village. The movie is just ten minutes long, so you’d wonder how such a story would fit in such a short amount of time. Well, the creators knew exactly how to use the time given to them, and they somehow managed to do this.

To fully understand Comedy, you should actually watch it at least twice (you’ll understand when you do ;)). The little girl and the black swordsman are surprisingly likable. In only ten minutes, Comedy shows that the two of them have very versatile, strong and interesting personalities. Something most anime can’t even do in an entire season. The little girl, coming up with such an idea and having the bravery to actually execute it (remember, she’s five and the English are about to invade) was extremely cute to see. The black swordsman also was given a friendly side in his obsession with books. The combination of these two characters works surprisingly well.

The character art in this short is unique. Characters have extremely white faces, with black clothing. Their faces are drawn rather messy, though the style this gives off only contributes to the overall quality of the movie. The animation shows that a lot of effort has been put into it. You can especially see this in the action scene. It’s a short one, though it’s extremely creative coordinated. Throughout the entire movie, an operatic voice takes care of the background music. It greatly contributes to the scene, but it also doesn’t drive the attention away from the really important parts.

Still, the fact remains that this short film is short. There is a little bit of background info given about the swordsman, though it isn’t enough. I’d love to know more about him and the little girl. I’d love to see more of this. But unfortunately, that’s impossible. Overall, while there isn’t really any tension or angst in this short, it keeps fascinating me. I just have to see it over and over again.