When I first read the premise of this series, I expected nothing of this series. A swimming-club where the main female lead likes to swim around in the nude. Fanservice anyone? Imagine my surprise when Umisho actually turned out (*gasp*) enjoyable. That’s probably the first for any fanservice-anime out there.
So, yes, there’s fanservice, and a lot of it. But while most other harems and similar series have characters with what I’d like to call the “paper-bag-syndrome” (by not being able to think for themselves, having no personality and being as interesting to watch as a paper bag), the creators of Umisho have put a bit of extra work to them. Fair enough, they all start out as clichés, but right from the start it becomes clear that every single character has one or more elements that go way beyond clichés and make them really fun to watch. Think of a shy big-breasted girl who is actually secretly a pervert, or the childhood friend who used to horribly abuse the male lead in the past, and of course the male captain of the swimming-team, who for once isn’t a huge pervert but instead a giant creep without any sense of shame. You’ll understand when you see him.
There’s also been a nice amount of detail put in the setting, where the competition between different swimming-clubs gets a nice amount of development, and every member of the club has at least an identifiable character-design. The character-designs are rather “pleasing” to the eye and the soundtrack gives the series a light overall tone. Overall, it’s one of the best fanservice-anime I’ve seen this far.
But yeah, there are enough times when this series loses itself in its excessive fanservice. Some scenes were just too outrageous and blatantly obvious that it nearly became painful. This series would definitely have been even better without the useless fanservice. Then there’s also the matter of the obligatory drama and romance that show up once in a while. It works in about 40% of the cases. The others are a tad too forced and aimed at fanboys.
It’s really nice to be finally proven wrong in my bias against fanservice-anime. Umisho is energetic, has likable characters who can think for themselves (really, at times we hear huge inner monologues when certain characters are attempting something stupid), and I laughed quite a bit at times. It’s nowhere near the best series out there but it remains fun to watch.]]>
Category: Anime Reviews
Claymore Review – 82/100
Shounen-fighting series have never been my favourite series. As far as I can recall, I’ve seen only one of them that really managed to deliver something truly original and creative that captivated me: The Law of Ueki. While Claymore doesn’t come close to that level, it does give a nice attempt, though.
While the start of the anime is just like any other serious shounen-series, as the episodes progress, it becomes clear that Claymore knows what it’s doing. Characters have sufficient backgrounds and they get fleshed out well enough outside and sometimes even during the fighting. The setting is solid and well-explored and overall, it knows how to build up very well.
Claymore basically consists out of arcs with the length of three or four episodes, with each of these arcs being different enough for everything to remain fresh. An interesting phenomenon also showed up as I kept watching: every successive arc increases the quality of the series significantly. This series starts out mediocre, but as the episodes go on, it just gets better and better and better. Even if some introductions may be dull, the conclusions for each successive arc were impressive.
This continues up to episode 20, and then something strange happens: the creators of the anime divert from the manga this series is based on, and things immediately fall apart. After that, there are still a few good moments, but it’s clear that the writers of the anime just aren’t as good as those of the manga and the result is a string of boring and overblown battles that fail to capture interest. It’s such a shame, as this anime was heading in such a good direction.
Still, don’t let that last bit ruin your enjoyment of this series. The majority of Claymore is well-written and a compelling story. The production-values are pretty good, and the soundtrack is enough to give the fights that little extra edge they need to become exciting. It may have its flaws, it may drag on a bit too much at times, but it’s definitely one of the better shounen-fighting series out there.]]>
Bokura no Review – 95/100
Bokura no, is the second series to finish of what I’d like to call the “big three” of the spring-season, along with Toward the Terra and Kaze no Shoujo Emily. For me, these three series stood out like no other for the past two seasons, and they just kept delivering quality over and over again. While Toward the Terra had its character-development, fast pacing and production-values, Bokura no shines not only through its well-written storyline, memorable characters and a rock-solid concept.
As soon as I read the concept, I knew we had something very special here. Revealing it entirely would be too much of a spoiler for the early episodes, but basically, this comes from the same mangaka as Narutaru. This time, however, a bunch of children are given the control not over monsters, but over a huge mecha. Bokura no shows what really happens when children get such a heavy burden placed upon themselves.
But don’t expect this to be a continuous angst-fest like Narutaru. The beauty of Bokura no is that the children involved aren’t special in any way. They’re just random and could in fact be your neighbour if you live in Japan. Each of these children is so incredibly different, and one of the many delightful elements of this series: every two or three episodes, the entire mood of the series changes for something completely different, while remaining logical and realistic. Sure, some children freak out, but that’s only one or two of them. Each of the children has his or her own problems and wishes, and that’s what makes this anime so brilliant. I could go more into detail, but I refuse for the sake of spoilers.
Then there’s the plot. Manga-readers should be aware that halfway through the anime, the director decided to go into a totally different direction when compared to the manga. Whether it improved or not, I can’t say, since I haven’t read it. But I can say that it has some definite competition with the storyline the director came up with. The pacing is very fast yet nothing feels rushed, and yet there’s a different and shocking plot twist nearly every episode.
Perhaps one of the few lesser points is that some episodes decide to focus on politics, instead of what this anime is really about: the children. But even this contributes to an overall mood of believability of the series. A giant robot has just appeared. Of course the military is going to react, and yet I see so many anime where mechas can just walk over the street without anyone noticing it. Also, when buildings get destroyed, they really get destroyed, and don’t magically disappear from the screen without any traces left. This really shows the impact that those giant robots can have on the societies.
If I had to mention a bad point… well, some plot-twists are a bit too coincidental, but that describes nearly 90% of all other anime as well. According to the manga-readers, the first half of the series also left out a few parts of developments for the different characters, but that’s probably in order to make it to air on tv, since the manga has a reputation to be rather gruesome at times. Still, I prefer this down-to-earth style of storytelling.
The character-designs are also perfect. Well, that’s what I think at least. The beauty of them is their simplicity: this really shows that the characters are just normal people, dragged into the story, instead of busty schoolgirls with hair in every colour of the rainbow and overly large pupils. Gonzo has been animating them, and it shows: when the animation is at its best, the characters look beautiful, despite their simplistic designs. One of the few elements of this series that isn’t outstanding is the music. It’s just good, but there are enough series with a better soundtrack.
Overall, while it isn’t the most popular anime out there, I absolutely loved this series. It’s delightfully different and unique, and quite possibly one of the most thought-provoking series of the year. While a few of the characters could have used a bit more development here and there, the rest of the series totally made up for it.]]>
El Cazador de la Bruja Review – 89/100
This may be one of my more biased reviews, simply because I’m such a large Bee-Train fan. Their particular style of storytelling may aggravate some, but I personally love it. Still, there’s one thing about this series that nearly nobody can deny: the soundtrack is awesome. Yuki Kajiura is behind it, and some of the tracks are among the best of her works. But what about the rest?
Well, El Cazador is the final instalment of the girls-with-guns trilogy of Bee-Train, with Noir and Madlax as its predecessors. One thing that you should know before watching is that while Noir featured some excellent gunfight, El Cazador… err… doesn’t. Believe me, you do NOT want to watch this series for the action, because quite frankly: it sucks.
Luckily, the director realized this quite early on, which leads to a change-of-focus in the middle of the series. The first half is basically a case-based series. Ellis and Nadie basically travel, and as they travel they meet people and explore their cases. These cases are definitely interesting to watch and thought-provoking, and in the meantime the story slowly develops, with nearly every episode brining a small bit of new information to keep the viewers on their toes.
The second half, however, is where El Cazador really starts to shine. The change of focus I mentioned above basically means that the different cases for each episode get abandoned, and instead the characters start developing. Because they already had been fleshed out by the first half, the results turn out absolutely amazing, with an excellent Shoujo-ai relationship if I say so myself. This continues up to the point where Ellis and Nadie become amazing characters, no matter what they do. When the final quarter began, I found myself not caring about the plot anymore, as long as the characters were on the screen. Now that’s a sign of good development.
But yeah, the plot does move awfully slow. The creators chose a very original setting of rural Mexico for this anime to take place in, and it manages to really show this throughout its storytelling, though the plot remains very simple, and just a tool for the characters. I liked how it was so incredibly down-to-earth, though, and how we finally don’t have such a huge plot deciding the fate of the world and stuff. This series is just about Ellis and her strange powers, and the few people that get caught up in her story, nothing more, and nothing less.
The simple storyline does have another advantage: the ending, while cheesy, is finally another one of those endings that isn’t rushed at all. There’s probably only one character (Lilio) that needed more development and background, but apart from that the final episode closes off the series perfectly, without any bad feelings.
Regarding the graphics, well it’s Bee-Train, so the character-designs look great, and the background-art doesn’t look as impressive as with other shows, but it really gives off the feeling of Mexico, when compared to nearly 90% of all other anime, which are set in Japan. About whether you’d like this or not depends on your patience, whether you find the different guests of the first half interesting and don’t mind that at a few times, the show delves into cheesiness. If that’s the case, then you’ll get rewarded with some amazing characters in the second half.
(On a side-note: with Shoujo-ai, I really DO mean Shoujo-ai. There is no yuri in this series.)]]>
Tetsuko no Tabi Review – 79/100
The summer-season came with a lot of interesting and unique series. Probably the weirdest of them is Tetsuko no Tabi. Not weird as in an extremely strange setting, but weird as in “how the heck did this get turned into an anime!?” Basically, what we have here is one of the very few non-fiction anime: a manga-writer is asked by her boss to accompany him and a travel-writer on a train-journey. The catch is that it really happened: they really did travel with various trains, and the anime is just an adaptation of the manga which records what happens. Obviously, this is never going to get popular. Still, I’d like to write this review, because this anime is really quite enjoyable.
The main reason behind Tetsuko no Tabi’s enjoyability-factor is the characters, or to be more specific: the chemistry between them. The travel-writer turns out to be a huge train-otaku, Yokomi. While otaku-characters are often annoying to watch, seeing his energy and passion for trains (and sometimes girls) is hilarious, but the character that really shines in this anime is the manga-writer, Kikuchi. She has no interest in trains whatsoever, and she keeps getting freaked out by Yokomi’s antics, but most importantly she’s delightfully witty and sarcastic. While most Japanese are often polite to each other, it made no sense for her to remain so, because Yokomi would read her true opinion anyway in the manga. Because of this, she passes the screen ranting against Yokomi to cool down. Her seiyuu is an unknown one (her only other major role was Kate in Red Garden), but she’s someone to watch out for. It really feels like she puts everything she has into her role, while having great fun doing so, and it works perfectly.
During some episodes, some guests also travel along with our protagonists. These are of course real people, who read the previous volumes of the manga and asked to join, and there are quite a few interesting people among them. The only downside to this is that the later half of the anime doesn’t feature any guests at all, with one exception, but he leaves quite quickly. But then again, that’s not something you can plan with non-fiction, is it?
The main flaw about Tetsuko no Tabi is that there isn’t much else apart from the characters. They’re everything in this anime. ^^; The story is much of the same. The individual episodes do have their own identity (for example, in one a ticket gets lost, in another they travel to Hokkaido, in another the characters are playing with a digital video-camera), but the series keeps consisting out of platforms and trains, and barely any other setting. The graphics are also very simplistic, especially the background art and CG, though at least the character-designs look simple yet good. The background music also consists out of standard but catchy tunes, and especially the OP is really fun to watch after a few times.
Overall, yes, it’s repetitive. But it’s also fun to watch and a great opportunity to learn a bit about the Japanese culture. Some of the sceneries are quite nice to watch. Still, I can imagine that most people won’t pick this up, and if you hate trains this series will be hard to like as well. At this point, only one episode has been subbed yet, and it doesn’t look like the rest of the series will come soon. I’ve just reviewed Potemayo as well, and I have to say that Tetsuko no Tabi definitely delivered more and consistent laughs for me.]]>
Potemayo Review – 73/100
At the start of the summer-season, I remember predicting that the title of best comedy of the season would go to either go to Sayonara Zetsumou-Sensei or Potemayo. Well, Sayonara Setzubou-sensei ended up winning it. That’s not to say Potemayo isn’t funny, but a in terms of comedies, there are better choices.
The comedy in Potemayo is basically based on timing. You’ll never know when something funny happens. This would have been perfect if the jokes were awesome, but it turns out that they’re hit-or-miss. You’ll never know when a joke lands, and you’ll never know when it’ll deliver. There are enough cute moments, but I’m afraid to say that the best jokes were in the first two episodes.
Basically, the story is about a strange chibi-girl who comes out of the main character’s fridge and starts living with him, and the anime basically follows their everyday activities along with the main character’s classmates. Again, the characters are a mixed bag. The ideas behind their characters are nice, but some of them just don’t get anywhere and keep repeating the same jokes over and over (Mutan and the ones around him come to mind). Other characters were quite interesting though. My favourites were Yasumi and Guchiko, who seemed to be behind some of the best jokes of the series and had the least amount of misfired ones.
Potemayo also has a few serious scenes, as an attempt to get some sympathy with the viewers, but for me at least, it didn’t work well. Most of the drama is annoying and rather lacklustre, and only the final episode ends up somewhat touching, until the ending turns out to be a disney-ending, at least. Potemayo also seems to think it’s a mystery-series by revealing the major part of the main character’s past in the final episode. I think it would have been better for this to have been revealed in one of the first episodes, so that he could have actually used this bit of much-needed development instead.
I may have been a bit too negative with this review, because I enjoyed watching it. Potemaho has got quite a few cute and genuinely funny moments; though don’t expect a masterful comedy here.]]>
Toward the Terra Review – 94/100
Those who’ve been frequenting my blog for the past few months probably have seen me ramble about the “big three” of the spring-season: Bokura no, Kaze no Shoujo Emily and Toward the Terra. While a lot more excellent series have been released in the past Spring and Summer-season, these three form the cream of the crop, they’re all consistently outstanding in their own way and are without a doubt my favourite series of the past half year.
Today the first one has ended: Toward the Terra. It’s an epic science-fiction series about outcasts with psychic powers called the Myu. The storytelling is incredibly fast-paced. You hardly run into an episode that doesn’t have some kind of climax. While most other anime need aftermath- and introduction-episodes for fleshing out the characters, the episodes in Toward the Terra flawlessly combine the quiet moments along with the tense ones, and it works like a charm.
It’s clear that the writers have talent, because not only do they write some of the best action-scenes (which finally are more about the characters than the action itself) I’ve seen the past year, they also excel in the character-development department. If you watch the first few episodes, you might wonder why such a beautiful tale can come from just teenagers, but don’t worry: around episode ten, we see countless of time-leaps, and the real meat of the series happens when around ten years have passed since then. This provides countless opportunities for character-development, and Toward the Terra grabs all of them. Because of this, it features one of the best antagonists I’ve seen in anime, just because the guy gets such an incredible amount of development. Around the middle of the series, the plot-twists become so mind-boggling that you won’t be able to predict them, and watch out for episodes 21 and 22: they’re quite close to the best and most emotionally charged episodes I’ve ever seen for the past year.
In terms of production-values, Toward the Terra also delivers. While it’s impossible to beat El Cazador’s soundtrack in the past season, it easily grabs second place with a bunch of epic tunes, perfect for the fast and slow pacing. The graphics also look awesome, but be aware that the character-designs are different from usual. If you’re used to the character-designs of series like Kanon or Shakugan no Shana, then you’re going to have to get used to the character-designs of Toward the Terra a bit (see the screenshots).
Regarding the bad points, for me the quieter episodes near the beginning and the ending that weren’t as good as their preceding ones were a tad disappointing. I expected to be blown away by the episodes, and while some did with a huge force, others didn’t. The first few episodes also might be a bit hard to get into, due to the fact that the main character gets a bit whiny at times, but don’t worry: he’ll change into someone much better.]]>
Tekkon Kinkreet Review – 89/100
Tekkon Kinkreet is, apart from Eien no Hou, the last of the big movies of 2006 to get released on DVD. As it has been produced by the Studio 4C, I was obviously looking forward to it, and I must say that it turned, along with Toki wo Kakeru Shoujo into the best of the movies, released in 2006.
Don’t be scared by the strange look of the series. What we’ve got here is a heart-wrenching drama between two brothers, who have been abandoned to the streets in the neighbourhood of Tekkon Kinkreet, or Treasure Island. In here, a strange culture has developed. The oldest of the brothers (Kuro, black) lives through fighting others, and yet the two of them are on good terms with the police due to the younger one(Shiro, white), who seems to have some kind of mental illness: even though he’s eleven years old, he acts like he’s six years younger.
Tekkon Kinkreet is chockfull of symbolism. It just shows how living on the streets can be incredibly fragile for young children, and yet the two boys somehow manage to mentally survive by depending on each other. The younger brother often holds entire monologues, which can either be totally random or incredibly deep. Also expect these monologues and the dialogues to be written with a great deal of care and attention, to make it feel as natural as possible.
For the past month, I’ve been watching a lot of different movies, though none of them really found enough time to develop both its main and side-characters well, though Tekkon Kinkreet finally shows an exception t this rule. The side-characters, a bunch of policemen and yakuza go surprisingly deep, and some of the saddest scenes in the movie are between them. I think that the main problem is that none of them really has any background, but they way they’re fleshed out and developed totally makes up for it.
The only real bad point comes from some supernatural elements that get introduced near the end of the movie, most importantly the final bad guy. Their symbolic value is huge, but I would have liked to see a bit more development in this department, as it feels a bit strange and out-of-place.
Overall, I can imagine that not a lot of people are going to be picking this up by just looking at the promo-art, but beyond waits a gem of a movie. Studio 4C are really one of the best movie-producers out there, and their unique style and originality proves to be a true delight. These guys know what it takes to make a good movie.]]>
School Days Review – 49/100
Now that it looks like that the final episode is going to be a DVD-only episode, I decided that I didn’t want to wait for such a long time just to close off this series. After all, it’s not like a bloody ending is going to save this series and heck, we all know what’s going to happen anyway. Shows like Red Garden and Zombie-Loan who also have a few DVD-only episodes have shown me that by the time they’re finished, my memory will have become too fuzzy to write a good review of it. I may edit this post after watching the final episode, but for now I just want to get over with this series.
Okay, let’s get started with this train-wreck now, shall we? School Days is another one of those hentai-game adaptations, but it’s a special one: the original game became notorious for a few of its rather bloody endings. Because of this, it’s become a fan favourite: you can’t go to any on-line anime-community where you won’t find tons of fans rambling about various death treats towards the main character. In the end though, this series became an utter failure.
Let’s start with about the only good point of this series: the male main character, Makoto. I know it’s ironic, but this guy actually finally deviates from some of the clichés that plague all of his colleagues, and most important of all: he’s realistic. It’s a sad thing, but in real life there are tons of idiots who just date girls without caring about any of them. You’ll love to hate this guy, and the things he does to all the poor girls in the series.
I wish I could say the same about the female characters though. The story is just so incredibly fixated on that bloody ending that it turns every single female character into a plot-device to get toward that ending. Actions are forced, characters conveniently run into each other, and most of them are a tad too often in too much angst, preventing them to connect with the viewers.
Still, at the halfway point, I would have actually considered School Days decent enough. Sure, it wasn’t perfect, but the love-triangle that develops was interesting enough to make me keep watching. And then, as the series draws to its end, everything falls apart with some of the most forced and blatantly obvious plot twists I’ve ever seen. I won’t mention them for the sake of spoilers, but you should be able to guess their nature, with School Days being a hentai-game adaptation and all.
And then the setting! Seriously, it nearly looks like Makoto is in a school with only TWO GUYS in it. There is another guy (the so-called “rival” that you see in nearly every hentai-game adaptation) but he’s just good for one minor plot-twist and he just disappears afterwards without leaving any trace.
Seriously, if you were planning to watch this one: don’t. The scriptwriting and plot twists are just too forced and artificial to really form a connection, not to mention that 75% of all the scenes are incredibly annoying to watch, due to the characters being teenagers and all. While I admit that it could have been good, the scriptwriters just ruined it completely.]]>
Code-E Review – 84/100
Toshiyuki Kato is probably one of the most versatile directors out there. He’s the genius behind Full Moon wo Sagashite and yet he also did its polar opposite of Ginga Densetsu Weed. Heck, he even worked on a few episodes of Simoun! For Code-E, he goes back to his slice-of-life roots, when he, combined with Simoun’s director Junji Nishimura, he delivers a charming love-triangle about a girl who can disrupt electrical equipment when startled.
The thing I like most about Code-E is the direction, interestingly enough. Every episode follows about the same pattern: the first major part of the episode is fairly dull, where the different characters are fleshed out. Then, when the end of the episode comes near and the climax starts, the production-values increase, a catchy tune starts playing and the entire anime becomes ten times better in just about every area. It’s here where the characters will connect with the viewer, and turn out to be pretty touching.
There isn’t much that this anime did wrong, actually. The only “real” flaw is that the major bad guy is the only underdeveloped character of the cast. But then again, we never see him much anyway. The biggest problem with Code-E is that it’s held back by its premise. It’s enough to be fairly satisfying, but it couldn’t really have reached the epic heights. I’d like to see this as an exercise in storytelling by a bunch of talented writers, and if you asked me, they succeeded, though I’d rather have seen them handle a storyline with huge potential like Simoun. Ah well, perhaps their future projects will arrive next year. It’s definitely going to be something to look forward to.
While it’s not the most neglected series of the season (that title goes without a doubt to Tetsuko no Tabi), the fact remains that it’s one of the more under-looked ones. The characters are touching and fun to watch without getting boring, the climaxes are exciting, I like to call this a success of an anime. Just be careful that the character-designs take a while to get used to. Especially that one particular male character (you know who you are…). In two weeks, the timeslot is going to be taken over by Mokke, and I’m already looking forward to it. With such a mediocre-looking season ahead, there’s a good chance I’m going to end up blogging it.]]>