Towa no Quon 02 is an improvement over the first movie, which is good to see. The animation budget went down a bit, but everything else is more interesting than the first movie.
The characters are less annoying, Quon is less perfect, the main side characters are better fleshed out, the lead female is much less of an idiot. Overall it’s a good movie spent, and proves to be a good antidote for all of the optimism that was present in the first movie. This puts it at least above Break Blade, where all of the movies just looked too much like each other. This movie instead is about a supernatural murder mystery. It’s actually well built up and the movie has a clear structure. That helps too.
Having said that though… the culprit behind the murders turned out to be one heck of an emo. The acting for the culprit was very bland, one sided and done to death. And overall, this movie still hasn’t really solved the way in which most of the characters are just too one-sided. This movie fulfilled its purpose in building up well, but it’s not there yet. The next number of movies need to continue this upward trend.
| Storytelling: | 8/10 – Nothing bad, but also nothing to really stand out. Solid build-up at least. |
| Characters: | 7/10 – Too many one-sided character and the main bad guy in particular was one heck of an emo. The main character got better, though. |
| Production-Values: | 8/10 – Much less eye candy compared to the first movie, but still there is plenty of movement. |
| Setting: | 8/10 – Solid concept and this movie built up well. It’s not used as well as how it could have been, though. |
Oh my god. I’ve finally finished the first part of this behemoth of a franchise. Legend of Galactic Heroes is completely unique. It took more 12 years for it to completely finish, from the opening movie to the final side-stories. It was un-rivaled at the time when it came out, and nothing like it ever appeared again. With amine being as it today, I don’t think there will ever be another series like it. I know that it’s long (it totals a whopping 162 episodes and three movies), however if you have the time to watch it and are tired of anime’s trends towards moe and cheap entertainment: by all means give it a chance.
This is one of those series that actually changed my perception. After finishing this series, my view of how to portray tactical warfare, strategical warfare and politics are completely different. In those three areas, this series just blows every other anime out there out of the water with its complexity, maturity and ingenuity. Instead of basing itself on weird logic, just about everything in this series is carefully thought through and fleshed out. The main cast of this series is intelligent, without being perfect: everyone in this show has his or her flaws to make up for it, ranging from hypocrisy to laziness and temper.
I remember that my biggest criticism for the first movie was that the creators tried to make the main characters smart by surrounding them by rashly thinking officers who can’t see the big picture. This thankfully also got fixed throughout this series. Not by just removing it, but giving it a very deep meaning within the story. Whereas the movie was just a depiction of a space battle, the TV-series has very strong themes about Autocracy versus Democracy, what it means to be a ruler and commander, and what it means to be a hero. The incompetent people who fail at their jobs are used perfectly in order to illustrate how difficult commanding an army can be.
And then, there is the character development. This series has 110 episodes, divided over 4 seasons. All four seasons stand on their own as different, and this particularly shows in the character development, and how the characters think and act. The main cast changes subtly, but significantly, but even the side characters grow throughout this series. And really: the cast of this series is ENORMOUS. What this show also likes to do is take minor side characters who haven’t appeared for what feels like 50 episodes, in order to put them a bit in the spot-lights and show how much they’ve changed.
Now, this series has undoubtedly parts that it does better than any other anime out there. Did it turn into my favourite series, though? For that question, I’m afraid that my answer is no.
At this point, Legend of Galactic Heroes is ridiculously hyped. Let me however clearly state what this show isn’t: it is not a roller-coaster ride. It’s also not a series that is easy to get into, it’s not a series that blows you away time after time, it’s not a series with an impeccable atmosphere, nor is it a series that’s very easy to watch and draw you in.
The storytelling in this series is very composed and polite. It’s so very calculated and the plot twists feel very natural, but I did have to force myself to really sit through such an emormous amount of 110 episodes. The direction delivers its plot twists as they are, and rarely adds extra spices to the storytelling in terms of inventive camera work, or passionate voice acting. The animation as well is very composed: it’s good enough to keep character models consistent, battles interesting, but only one out of 10 or so episodes really goes beyond that. And heck, the episodes with the best animation aren’t the most important ones to the plot, and there is one character death episode that actually suffers from very bad animation. It’s a bit like reading a history book, really: it is incredibly interesting to see how everything plays out, but it still feels like something is missing when you compare it to other forms of entertainment.
110 episodes is really long. Nevertheless though, I still believe that this was the absolute best that anime had to offer until Escaflowne came out.
Short Synopsis: Our lead character is a young genius pilot.
Well, first things first: it’s awesome to see Gonzo back. It’s not just the series they make. It’s because of their balls: they like to take risks like no other studio out there, and that’s why I became a fan of them, even though they did release their fair share of crap. Now, as for this series: it looks just gorgeous. The CG is still up to Gonzo’s high standards and the creators didn’t just copy designs from the first season, but came up with a whole new set of eye candy that certainly does not stand out as inferior to its predecessor. As for the story of this episode: it’s definitely more childish than the first season, and shows a bunch of teenagers being able to disrupt an entire fleet. The first season had this too, but was a lot more subtle about it, especially with the enemy fleet having very stuck-up commanders and deploying no vanships whatsoever to intercept the main cast. There’s also fanservice, though thankfully not as much as was feared. The acting is overall very good, though it does have a number of weak points. The direction is also quite solid, despite the lighter tone. This is a typical example of a first episode with a lot of potential to become amazing, but also with quite a number of things that can hold it back and didn’t work out as well as you’d hope. Yup, that’s Gonzo alright.
OP: The OP of the first season was much better.
ED: A familiar voice. The song is a bit redundant after hearing it in other EDs, but the picture slideshow looks nice.
Potential: 80%
Guilty Crown
Short Synopsis: Our lead character meets a half-naked girl.
That was absolutely gorgeous. The first episode of Guilty crown is a visual feast, in the way that just about every frame is meticulously detailed and well drawn, in the way that only Production IG can do for a television series. If they keep this up, then this will very likely be the prettiest Noitamina series of the year. As for the rest of the episode though: there were a number of issues I had with it. The biggest is that outside of the visuals, I miss creativity: the scenario of this episode had a been there, done that”-feeling, and the main characters are a bunch of walking cliches. On one hand you have the really bland male main character, and on the other hand we have this female who has special powers, is his childhood friend, and gives the male lead a special weapon that he can use to kick ass. There have been way too many shows already with that premise, and the only thing that this show really added to that was its gorgeous visuals. This is a show that needs to grow significantly. But heck: at least the characters are far from as stupid or annoying as they were in Fractale.
OP: Good idea to combine it with the content of the episode.
ED: A bit of a dull ballad with nice art from the promo images.
Potential: 75%
Un-Go
Short Synopsis: Our lead character solves mysteries.
Here is a very interesting one, and I don’t mean that in the way you might expect. At first this episode started off like your average murder mystery series: the protagonists happened to be stuck in a room full of people where someone conveniently got murdered. It was well built up, but strangely mundane. Then however the second half came around and this episode just kept switching moods, themes and atmospheres. This series is attempting to breathe a new wind into the episodic murder mystery genre. This episode had science fiction, horror, and the post-apocalypse all stuffed together. This was the strange case of not the culprit getting some surprise added depth, but the setting itself became a lot more intriguing once this episode started putting the pieces of its puzzle together. On top of that, this episode was well produced and well directed with very natural camera work. The creators definitely took creative liberties on the original work it’s based on, and the episodic set-up really allows them to try a wide variety of different stuff. Oh, and as an added bonus this episode had the best use of music and sounds of the entire season so far. My only warning for when you plan to check it out: the characters. They are not on the list of priorities for this series.
OP: A bit of a dull song, but lots of neat eye candy.
ED: By far the best ED of the seasons. Heck, even the OPs get nowhere as close to the imaginative visuals and music that was displayed here.
Potential: 90%]]> 
Short Synopsis: Our lead character receives a baby from out of nowhere.
Just… what the hell was that supposed to be? This was… so bad that it became hilarious again. This episode was five minutes long, and it featured some of the worst animation and most wooden characterization of the entire season. The plot where a bullied girl takes care of a devil baby who is literally dropped into her bed (I really do mean literally: there are two hands visible who really drop that thing from out of this random hole in the air) is just ridiculously stupid and the acting may be so stiff and wooden that it becomes hilarious, it’s the kind of hilarious that’s probably going to be fun one episode. Of five minutes.
OP: Those vocals! Make them stop!
Potential: 0%
Mirai Nikki
Short Synopsis: Our lead character has a stalker.
Ooh, I like this one. This one turned out to be an excellent suspense series, with a very creative premise of using diaries that can predict the future. This episode was especially good at portraying the main character, and especially relating in how he slowly realized how badly he has been screwed over; his reactions were just priceless, and it gives this show a whiff of psychological horror that I can really appreciate. This episode was well animated, which is also a plus and for once an episode was fast-paced, without rushing though everything. There was one part where this episode fell down, though: the bad guy of this episode. He was just… there and we really don’t know anything about him. The creators had better try harder for the next characters to run into our main character, because this has potential to become a really fun series. Oh, and finally a series has the balls to have school that doesn’t feature school uniforms. That gives the character designers much more freedom, and it shows: this show really has this unique look without having a particularly different art style.
ED: Clever
Potential: 80%
Mobile Suit Gunam AGE
Short Synopsis: Our lead character pilots a giant robot.
Oh you’ve got to be kidding me. The big selling point of Gundam AGE was that it would show a completely different version of the regular Gundam series. In the end though, all that that amounted to was a new coat. It actually did nothing to remove the most obnoxious parts of the franchise. The male lead still is a teenager who for very convenient reasons ends up piloting a giant robot stronger than all others, he instantly knows how to pilot it, the female lead is completely useless, and there is a lot of angst about how bad war is. Sunrise, for the love of god try something new for a change. Probably the most insulting part is how pathetic the military is: even though they have never been attacked, they’ve only got one capable pilot. On top of that, they allow a twelve year old boy to design new mobile suits for God knows how much money. Really guys: designing and coordinating such a large-scale project isn’t so easy that you can just take off to school at the same time. Oh, and another cliche: everyone is an idiot in order to make the male lead look smart. Throughout the entire episode he is the only one who worries about the incoming invasion. Please Sunrise: you’re mecha series rocked because of how creative they were. This is not the way to do it.
OP: You can see that a lot of budget was put behind this, but it’s just too mainstream to really work. The flying scenes are good, though.
ED: This is pretty decent, though.
Potential: 30%]]> 
Short Synopsis: Our lead character is hungry.
So, it’s finally time for my most anticipated harem show of the season, and this definitely is a step above all of the others. There is first of all the premise of this series, but on top of that it also had by far the best direction of the bunch. This first episode was well told, had some great ideas into it, and especially the way in which the creators used amnesia in this episode in order to introduce everyone worked well, but also the use of camera angles was quite inspired. David Production also delivers in the animation: they really have the talent to breathe life into characters who seem very generic at first. Also, here is the thing about the next-best harem shows this season: Horizon and Majikoi may be enjoyable, they’re also badly acted. This episode of Ben-To wasn’t. The acting was actually quite good. The male lead is one of the first to actually do impressions (including a bizarre Norio Wakamoto impression), the females are based on stereotypes, but their behavior tries to move away from that. and attempts to give them a more colourful personality. Oh, and the use of music also was very good: it was well timed, the soundtrack is creative and it helps building up the tension.
OP: It has energy, but still a bit dull.
ED: Not a bunch of images, but actually relates to the series, though it does seem rather cheesy. The song still is badly sung.
Potential: 80%
Shakugan no Shana III
Short Synopsis: Our lead character is gone.
Okay, so apparently things actually happened in the second season. I gave up on that one after its second episode so I wouldn’t know exactly how it happened, but what this episode seemed to hint at rather scared me a bit. Of course, it’s good to see that at this point Shana has predictably changed from tsun to dere, so there’ll be no more “urusai urusai urusai”, and this episode was admittedly better than Hidan no Aria’s opening(not that that says much, though), but seriously. Are the creators really building up to a cheese ball finale where Shana is forced to have to fight Yuuji? Is that what these 80 episodes are building up to? Such a soap opera twist?! Please tell me that I’m wrong. I mean, pulling such a thing for a novelty is one thing. but to make it the main focus of 80 whopping episodes!?
OP: Not bad, but nothing special either.
ED: This is dull J-pop, though, where the limitations of the singer are really shown.
Potential: 35%
Sekai-Ichi Hatsukoi 2
Short Synopsis: Our lead character is gay.
Here’s the thing with this series: cut it in half, remove the two non-main stories, and you’d have a very good story about a bunch of manga editors. The only reason why I dropped the original series is because it switched over to the second story, which put fanservice and blushing bishies before story and characters. This first episode of Sekai-Ichi Hatsukoi’s first episode reminded me again of why I originally liked the series: it’s good slice of life, it portrays the stress of being a manga editor quite well and it’s quite funny. There is progress: instead of dealing with manga authors, the main character now has to deal with colleagues and printers, which take a completely different set of skills. In terms of the romance though… I didn’t feel like I missed much actually. Only this episode developed the relationship between the two male leads further and really, they’re pretty interesting characters. The biggest thing that this series needs to worry about now is to avoid Junjo Romantica 2’s big pitfall of not going anywhere.
OP: Try to do something different for a change.
ED: Dull J-rock
Potential: 70%]]> 
Short Synopsis: Our lead character is a transfer student with special powers.
Seeing as how this was the most hyped up series of the new season… it felt oddly disappointing. I’m not referring to the characters, although that pee-moment certainly didn’t help, but what striked me the most is that the storytelling was completely off. In particular, this episode didn’t seem to care much about timing or build up. It didn’t seem to know how to create an atmosphere, it jumped around way too much instead of establishing things, and everything happened way too quickly . This episode had a very short attention span, which really hurt any attempts on drawing in the viewer: one moment the main character is in a shop, the next he dives in a tv. It just doesn’t flow well and there were a lot of anti-climaxes in this episode. Was the game really that long, forcing such a fast pacing? Oh, and this is just a small detail, but I consider it very important too: the show had what sounded like a great soundtrack, but it didn’t seem well used at all. There were lots of scenes with no background music at all, and it only started playing at the most predictable moments.
OP: Funky
ED: Again, funky. If only the rest of the soundtrack was like this.
Potential: 60%
Boku wa Tomodachi ga Sukunai
Short Synopsis: Our lead character is surrounded by cute girls.
For a while, this episode actually avoided the usual warning signs. When it was just the main male and female together, this show avoided fanservice, the female lead was eloquent, rather than stupid, and about the only big cliche was the deadpan snarker male lead. Then the second female lead arrived, the girls turned tsundere and they wasted no time in making boob jokes. This show… when I first read that it’d be about people who are bad at being friends, I thought that this would be a show about outcasts. Instead, the main cast consists out of two people with foreign looks, suffering from Japan’s xenophoby, and another character who refuses to talk to others because of… arrogance I guess. That was not what I expected. Strangely enough, these people didn’t seem to suffer from insecurities at all. Instead, the emotion that prevailed here was annoyance for not being able to make friends. It doesn’t have the biggest cliches: aside from the boob jokes this episode refrained from beating any dead horses, but it has relatively little that it can call its own. The xenophobia was probably this episode’s biggest asset, but that was handled very one-sidedly: everyone is afraid of the main characters, aside from the really good-looking girls (yay for subtlety!). This was neither the worst moe show of the season, but it also certainly wasn’t the best.
OP: FANSERVICE!
ED: Why the nuns?
Potential: 40%
Chihayafuru
Short Synopsis: Our lead character plays card games.
This had the best animation of the new season so far. Seriously, Madhouse made this series look absolutely gorgeous. The use of cg is excellent, while it completely lacks the acting problems of Madhouse’s usual series. The shots are all creative, the animation is smooth and life-like. It would be awesome if the creators could keep it up like that. The rest of the episode also was wonderful: instead of most series about games, the female lead Chihaya isn’t a complete rookie at the start: she has been playing the card games (and seriously, they’re not what you think: this is miles away from Yugioh) for a few years now. In fact, this series series shows how she got introduced to it when she was still a grade schooler. What especially caught me however was how well it used its animation to portray the game. The soundtrack is also exceptionally well used. This is one to keep an eye out for: rock-solid… though it’s a shame that it’s a manga adaptation. Of a manga that isn’t finished yet.
OP: A bit generic, but certainly not the worst of the season.
ED: Simple, but very pretty visuals, with a decent ballad.
Potential: 90%]]> 
Short Synopsis: Our lead character transfers to an all-girl high school. While being a male.
This show is what I’d call pretentious: it tries to be serious, but has actually no idea what it’s doing. Here is what I mean by that: this show is very schizophrenic. On one hand, it really seems to want to tell a good story. It’s Manglobe: the character designs may be abysmal, but the inbetween animation is quite solid. This episode started off with a very quiet act, in which the main character is simply trying to find his sister, who got lost. This was actually very effective in establishing their characters, and to introduce the main female (no panty-shots, accidental groping or violence!). The acting here was pretty good. And then this show continues to just nullify that by having the sister attempt to bathe with the male lead. Nearly exactly like how TWGOK did it. Things then get from bad to worse when it turns out that the first half was saving all of its cliches for the second half. The most pretentious part is the drama, though. This show is trying to be very serious with it, but what is it about? The colour of pure love, and that the main female lead very stubbornly refuses to open up her school for boys. It’s completely insubstantial, even though this show acts like it struck gold with it. Also, who the hell designed that abomination that is supposed to be a cat?
ED: Who the hell designed that abomination that is supposed to be a cat?
Potential: 30%
Maken-Ki
Short Synopsis: Our lead character gets to live together with a bunch of cute girls.
I really have a question to ask to the fans of harem series like Maken-Ki: what is their appeal? What is the appeal of seeing the same characters over and over again? What is the appeal of watching shows over and over where the main character is a loser, the main girl characters are idiots and stereotypes? What makes it worth watching when the characters are so damn unlikable as these people, and that over and over again (harem shows are often the most represented genre in any season)? Is it really just the boobs, or is my bias preventing me from noticing their merits? Why are there so many series entirely dedicated to fanservice, when there is plenty of porn around? In any case, my impression of this episode was as follows: it had the most unlikable male lead I’ve seen in any first episode this year. His acting was bad and his only defining traits are being wimpy and horny: during the entire episode he was either just standing there and mumbling, or getting horny from nearby females. The females meanwhile were the standard uninspired idiots and stereotypes that happened to have special powers. The fanservice also was pretty tasteless with the camera’s uncanny ability to always look for some angle to how a person’s ass.
ED: Is it really interesting watching a guy getting turned on?
Potential: 10%
Sengoku Paradise: Kiwami
Short Synopsis: Our lead character is another re-interpretation of the famous sengoku lords.
Sengoku Basara, what have you done? Ever since you aired there has been a sudden influx of series that try to cash in on the popularity of the Sengoku era. This ranges from very good and well constructed series (Hyouge Mono), to very silly and poorly written gag shows (Tono to Issho). I was ready to label Sengoku Paradise amongst the latter… however this first episode was actually funny. This is mostly due to a director who knows what a crappy premise he has to deal with, and just goes all out for the heck of it. The result is a camera guy who hyperactively jumps from one shot to the other and characters who have a lot of fun overacting the hell out of their characters. There are some good jokes in this episode. But to be honest, this doesn’t seem like a show with much staying powers, and this was likely the best episode of the series. The characters are bound to get dull after more than 3 minutes (yes, these episodes are only 3 minutes long), the jokes are of the type that get old when they’re already repeated once and I don’t think that the creators have enough ideas to keep this one fresh.
OP: Very badly sung, but that was definitely done on purpose.
Potential: 45%%]]> 
Short Synopsis: Our lead character is an average high school boy.
Agh! Why does this air on the exact. same. date as Tamayura?! I mean, it has its qualities on its own, but when it airs right after what in the end is a superior slice of life series it is in real danger of just being overshadowed. Still, despite that Kimi to Boku has this strange kind of catchiness. It suffered from trying to be too ironic, its characters still stick a bit too much to their stereotypes (which especially sticks out with such a small cast of only four characters), but the dialogue between them in the end was quite enjoyable. These guys are down to earth, and in any case it’s good to see another slice of life series that is in no danger of being overrun by boob jokes. There’s a scene of their past together, which is also a good sign and this episode was also good at portraying things going on in the background. This will probably be a very uneventful series that fleshes its characters out through its dialogue, and based on that, this episode did well and has the potential to last through 26 episodes.
OP: Another boring ballad. The use of photographs again does not help after seeing Tamayura do this so much better…
ED: A bunch of (admittedly good) drawings, with another dull song.
Potential: 75%
Tamayura ~ Hitotose
Short Synopsis: Our lead character is just a regular teenager.
Yes! Yes! Yes! The creators actually did it! Instead of just continuing with showing just a bunch of random sketches around the main cast, this entire episode was dedicated to the past of the main female character. Not only do we get to see her in the days when she was away from the rest of the main cast, but they also made clever use of that she’s a photographer. Throughout the episode we got to see a bunch of slide-shows, which did a wonderful job of painting a picture of her childhood. The writing in this episode also was great, combining slice of life and realistic dialogue with subtle morals and life lessons. Sato Junichi really is on fire this season, and it’s almost unfair competition to Kimi to Boku with how good this was. This really is what I want from a slice of life series: realistic characters, visible growth, and plenty of scenes to relate to. Knowing the creators we’re not going to get a slew of boob jokes or other bad comedy, nor was the drama in this episode forced or cheesy. Really, ideally every episode needs to be like this.
OP: Fits the series perfectly, is well sung, and again makes great use of photography.
ED: The singer is a bit weak, but the use of photographs once again is great.
Potential: 85%
Phi Brain
Short Synopsis: Our lead character solves puzzles.
Yeah. This was pretty much the best opening episode of the new season to me. I mean, this is a series with a strange premise: the main character is really tempted by just puzzles. But that’s the thing: it’s creative, and it showed in this episode. While the main characters solves sudoku puzzles like its nothing (yes, there is sudoku in this show), the larger puzzles are these huge imaginative contraptions that are well made and have interesting solutions. Waht really sold me on this series however, is how expressive it is. It’s got the best OP of the season, the best ED, the best character-designs (even including the series that still have to air), and most importantly: the animation and voice acting brought the characters to life. The female lead is actually a damsel in distress who is useful: on one hand she’s there to increase tension, but she’s also more athletic and more observant than the male lead, who in his turn also isn’t your average shounen hero. He thankfully is miles away from the usual whiny and hot blooded main character. The music is excellent, the pacing rocks. You can really see Sato Junichi at work here.
OP: Best of the season so far. Solid song and great visuals.
ED: Nice use of a puzzle-like slide show.
Potential: 90%]]> 
Short Synopsis: Our lead character gets a digimon for himself.
I keep hoping for the good kiddie shows to come back, but after Nippon Animation’s demise and how bad the sales were on the WMT revival series, I’ve pretty much given up. This episodes introduces a new low for the digimon franchise. Before, you could still give it credit for originality. With this though, it has given up all pretense and just flat out stated that it aims to be a pokemon rip-off. I could still get behind the first Xros Wars as an experiment, but with this, the creators came with an even more blatant premise, an even dumber male lead and no semblance of progress whatsoever. The worst part of this episode was where the male lead saw a random digimon walking around, and killed it. Yes, kids: randomly attacking strangers is good! The sole salvation of this is that the animators had their moments. Just too bad that they have to work with bland and uninspired character designs.
OP: Bland pop tune, but at least the visuals aren’t bad.
Potential: 0%
Fate/Zero – Again
Short Synopsis: Our lead character is still going to fight in a war for the holy grail.
Erm. Okay. So yesterday when I watched Fate/Zero, I forgot that it was supposed to start with a double episode, and I accidentally ended up watching a version of this episode that just contained the first half. That was a headdesk moment. In any case, now that I watched the second half of this episode, things fall even more into place, because the end of this episode had an actual climax that fitted well: the summoning of the servants. In any case, the second half of this episode pretty much continued in the same style of first wanting to set everything up correctly, rather than start with a huge climax immediately to draw in viewers. I haven’t watched Fate/Stay Night beyond a few episodes, so the only character I recognized was the younger version of a very annoying tsundere, but apart from that the main cast has a lot of potential, and they’re in no way as annoying as from the Fate/Stay Night anime.
ED: Bland J-rock. The visuals are actually well animated, but seem a bit undirected and chaotic. Also, why did you spoil the identity of the seventh magus when the episode tried to be all mysterious about it?
ED2: Just a black screen with credits. The lack of vocals makes it better than the first ED, but still unimpressive.
Potential: 85%
Hunter X Hunter
Short Synopsis: Our lead character wants to become a hunter
I may have been bitching about this series, but don’t get me wrong: if this gets done right, it can easily be the best shounen of the past years. The problem is that we won’t know about the intentions of the people who are tasked with adapting this thing until the Yorkshin arc arrives, especially because this series will be aimed at a younger audience. The big question is: do these creators believe that kids are idiots, or will they actually put in effort just like what studios as Nippon Animation do? Now, this episode was definitely faster-paced than the first season, and because of that it didn’t have as much detail in it as well. The hunter that Gon runs into, who tells him about his father? Completely gone, which is a bit of a pity because it gave the first season a unique start. Still, the creators put in effort here. The characters are true to themselves, and especially the captain, who was definitely made to appeal more to kids, actually worked well as this old sea captain. The voice actors do have their issues: Gon yells a bit too much, while Leorio’s voice actor didn’t know whether he should use Leorio’s voice of the first season, or just stick to his own. It definitely was a fun episode. The big challenge for this series seems to be its pacing: this series wants to go fast, which inevitably will lead to some things getting cut. Do not cut the best parts!
OP: Cheesy J-pop and running.
ED: Hisako?!
Potential: 75%]]> 
Shounen isn’t my favourite genre, but I have enjoyed plenty of the better series in the genre. Ao no Exorcist is a sneaky one though: at first it first seems to avoid a lot of the overused cliches that plague the genre… only to fall into them anyways.
What sets Ao no Exorcist apart is that it’s typical shounen, but done well. The main character is a hot headed brat, but he’s well fleshed out and has good development and reasons for his actions. The show inevitably ends up at an academy, but school assignments that the characters have to do are fun, interesting and lead to quite a bit of character development.
The big problem is that this series is way too epic for what it wants to be. On one hand it aims for high school hijinks and a look at exorcists in training, and on the other it is involved in an international plot involving to purge the strongest demon known to man: Satan. The main character may be Satan’s son and all, but the two parts don’t mesh at all and leave a terribly divided series.
The part of the series that suffers the least is the one that focuses on the high school. It’s not ambitious, but it’s fun, the characters are genuine and they have a great chemistry between them. The plot against satan unfortunately is horribly rushed, with in the end Satan magically forgetting to use a lot of his powers in order to actually prevent the main cast from not instantly dying. It’s full of bland twists and unoriginal plot devices that are way too constrained with trying to go for a “by the books”-ending. This series is based on a manga, but decides to go with its own storyline for its final third. While that isn’t immediately a bad thing, it just doesn’t work here.
A-1 has made sure of great animation, but in the end there are just many better shounen series out there. Ao no Exorcist was a nice attempt, but it lacks vision.