Category: Other:

Ride Back Review – 85/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews



When it started, Ride Back was a strange beast. With its concept of uniting strange motorbikes with arms with military totalitarianism, I was on one hand charmed by the characters, on the other hand it just kept testing my suspense of disbelief with overly coincidental plot twists that were only introduced for the sake of the story. Nevertheless, now that I’ve finished this series, I don’t feel like whining anymore. Ride Back rocks, despite some of the sacrifices it had to make.

In the end, Ride Back is a character-study of the female lead: Rin Ogata. It’s about many small things: criticism against military entering politics, simple motorbike racing, and terrorism; it’s about how a seemingly innocent action can have disastrous consequences and trying to find one’s true potential. and the beauty of Ride Back is that somehow, it all makes these widely diverse themes into a whole in only 12 episodes. The show very subtly evolves from light college adventures to a dark story about terrorism, but the whole thread of Rin’s development keeps it on one track and it prevents the series from dragging on, and while it may seem like a bit questionable as it goes on, the series comes together wonderfully in the end.

I also really must praise Madhouse’s visuals yet again. They went with another different art style this time, and especially the character-designs look really good and down to earth. There’s a slight issue that the CG doesn’t mesh in with the rest of the visuals, but even that could have been done much, much worse. And the series’ soundtrack also is a very powerful one.

So overall, I ended up liking this series much more than I thought. It’s got a questionable start, and does tend to pull some random coincidences simply for the sake of its story, but Rin’s development is rock-solid, which is especially rare for such a small 12-episode series. It’s no instant classic, but it’s yet again a worthy addition to Madhouse’s excellent repertoire.

Storytelling: 8/10
Characters: 9/10
Production-Values: 9/10
Setting: 8/10

Mobile Suit Gundam 00 Second Season Review – 77,5/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews, Mobile Suit Gundam 00



Gundam 00 was the first long Gundam series that was split into two halves of about 25 episodes, rather than continuing for a full run of 50. In te end, it turned out into a decent series: it does the job it’s supposed to do, but it wasn’t anything really outstanding. The second season unfortunately was a bit weaker than the first.

While the first series had some interesting politics in the beginning, the second season drops the politics aspect completely and instead focuses much more on delivering solid action and the story becomes much more character-focused. Central to the story are various different conflicts between opposing sides, and these really range from utterly abysmal (Saji and Louise whine way too much throughout the series) to engaging and pretty good (Allelujahh and Marie). Especially Setsuna deserves credit, as he grows into a solid and capable male lead.

This approach has its good and bad sides. As I said: whenever the good characters take up the spotlight, the series becomes pretty enjoyable, but in the end the second season is just too formulaic. There are too many random battles that don’t stand apart from each other; they hardly ever resolve something and usually end up with both parties simply retreating. Most of the major villains lack development (especially the innovators, who apart from Regetta have as much personality as a paper bag), and all in all, this second season could have also been done in 13 episodes without losing much of the content or impact.

So in the end, this really is a series for those who want lots of solid action. If you’re not into that, then there really isn’t a lot left to watch in this series. The animation pretty good overall, but for me it was hardly ever really aestetically pleasing; the soundtrack is excellent, though. It’s not a bad series by far, and it has some pretty enjoyable parts (my personal favourite being the fall of the elevator), but there are lots of better mecha-series out there.

Storytelling: 8/10
Characters: 8/10
Production-Values: 8/10
Setting: 7/10

White Album Review – 75/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews, White Album



I really wanted to like White Album. It had so many good ideas and concepts for a romance show. It had such a wonderful style and execution, it had the potential to be an incredible series. And yet… I just can’t. Beware: this series is very, very easy to dislike.

White Album is a harem series, but it immediately sets itself apart from the rest of its genre by its execution. The pacing is slow, and instead of focusing on silly comedy, this show is driven by the characters’ emotions, portrayed with a wonderful sense of subtlety. Often, we get small glimpses of what characters are thinking, either through short flashbacks, or their thoughts written on the screen. For a fan of subtlety as myself, this series really started out incredibly promising.

The cast of the series is very daring: Touya himself is far away from your typical paper-bag male lead, and instead he is an incredibly flawed character. Throughout the entire series, you’ll be screaming at him for the things he does. In fact, the rest of the cast is also pretty flawed, and it’s one of the driving forces of the series. Kabitzin wrote an excellent article on that matter, and even though it caused many people to hate this series, I consider it at one of the show’s strengths.

But in the end I just can’t recommend this show. I hate to say it, but it’s just too ambitious for its own good. It wants to do too many things and sacrifices the time it needs to build these up. Characters start crying and weeping way too easily in this show, and in most of the times it just feels too forced and directed. The show also has its share of plotholes here and there that only serve to increase the huge drama, but it never really seems to take control of where the drama goes to.

So in the end, the best parts of the show are the quiet bits, in which the drama subtly unfold without any forced crying or yelling. It’s a bloody shame; this show could have been amazing, but in the end it failed to live up to the expectations. I really appreciate the effort, but not every experiment goes exactly according to plans. I’d love to see a series that takes this series’ formula and does pace it properly, though.

Storytelling: 9/10
Characters: 7/10
Production-Values: 8/10
Setting: 6/10

Birdy the Mighty Decode 2 Review – 95/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews, Birdy the Mighty Decode



The first season of Birdy the Mighty Decode was a pretty good series that unfortunately got held back by its own formula and never really hit any heights, and especially the male lead Senkawa caused quite some annoyances. Then the second season came, and surpassed it in just about every aspect. I’m not exaggerating here: the second season managed to take a good series and made it utterly incredible.

To begin with, those who were turned off by the annoying teenaged romance in the first season are going to be delighted, as Senkawa plays a much smaller part in the series and his romance is now something of the past. Instead, it’s time for the female lead (Birdy) to have her taste a bit of romance and it’s so much more memorable. What also surprised me was that the plot of the second season takes place on a much smaller scale: instead of trying to save the world from some sort of evil, the second season instead is about the past of the characters, and revenge for what happened in it. The amazing cast of characters turns this into an incredibly emotional story.

But through all the drama, what’s so special about this series is that it never forgets that this series is taking place inside a world that’s alive, instead of a bunch of places that serve just to tell the story. Even though this is a very dark series, it never forgets to insert some slice of life moments in order to bring this setting to life. Even though Senkawa’s classmates have absolutely nothing to do with the main story, they make countless reappearances as the creators show how they continue to lead their lives after chaos that was caused in the first season. Even in the final episodes, this doesn’t change (compare that to most other similar series, which at that point are too busy saving the world to care about such a thing), and yet the series closes off with an amazing ending.

And the production values! The action series in this series are absolutely stunning. The animation is very messy, but because of that there is lots and lots of movement and even more detail in them. The brutality of the hand to hand combat in this show continues to surprise, as the creators aren’t afraid to show the most graphics deaths and beatings on the screen without any cheap tricks to hide it whatsoever. Combine that with the single best soundtrack of the entire season, and you have a visual feast.

Series like this one really are the reason why I’m still a big fan of anime. This series is utterly incredible in just about everything it does, and it’s an incredible contrast with the first season, which simply looks mediocre in comparison and it’s been without a doubt my favourite show of the past Winter Season.

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

Tales of the Abyss Review – 82,5/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews



The thing I like about the Tales of-games adaptations is that they’re all done by different animation companies with different ideas. This way, the shows remain fresh, and are prevented from getting milked out, since all of them have their own styles now. Tales of the Abyss, while it suffers from some of the major pitfalls of RPG-adaptations, also manages to avoid quite a few of them, and is worth the watch if you’re into fantasy series.

The biggest pitfall it failed to avoid is of course the very questionable power management: teenagers have enough magical powers to save the world compared to adults with much more experience, little girls can control monsters as if it’s nothing, and trained royal guards die as easy as flies. It’s something that’s very hard to avoid in this genre, but it’s still pretty grating.

Thankfully though, the show has enough to make up for this. It really stands out in its character-development, which is pretty much a trademark of the Tales of-games by now. A lot of emphasis is put on internal trust: a lot of the main characters in this series are pretty flawed, and because they all have their own mistakes and secrets, a memorable bond grows between them. Especially the lead character, Luke is notable for this, as even though he may look like it, he’s far away from your typical male lead in such fantasy series. To explain why would be too much of a spoiler, though.

The storyline is also very well done, and impressive for an RPG adaptation. For once the king of an empire can be something different from either a fascistic pig or an incompetent flower-child. The show has plenty of villains, but all of them have at least decent motivations for their actions. The storyline is pretty complex, and no episode is really wasted, and I especially liked how th emagic system in this show has turned into a sort of science. Especially how it affects the world that the characters live in is very detailed and full of imagination.

Near the end of the series, the show does get a bit rushed, though: it wants a bit too much in too little time, and especially the ending of the series just feels too lazy, but apart from that we have ourselves a very good series here. While it never really hit any heights, it’s been a solid and enjoyable series.

Storytelling: 8/10
Characters: 9/10
Production-Values: 8/10
Setting: 8/10

Genji Monogatari Sennenki Review – 85/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews, Genji Monogatari Sennenki



One of the more unique series that started airing in the past winter season (not that that says much since more than half of them were sequels, but okay) was Genji Monogatari: an adaptation of a novel that’s about 1000 years old by now. While that sounds a bit strange at first, the unique flavour comes from the director Osamu Dezaki, who managed to turn this series into a feast for the senses, although it’s obviously not for everyone.

Genji Monogatari is romance. It’s about a prince called Genji who ends up screwing countless of women, call him the Japanese version of Don Juan if you want. This anime stands out because of its specific style of storytelling: the pacing is kept tight, with a lot of focus on emotions and bringing these out of the viewer and the characters. The animation is full of visual effects, and overly present filters and sparkling overlays, sound effects are either overly present or kept completely quiet, depending on the situation. And in the end, it works: although only 11 episodes, Genji Monogatari is a consistent emotional ride from start to finish.

But yeah, the style of this series is a double edged sword, because as easy as it is for some to like it, it’s also a style that’s very easy to dislike. The character-designs are nothing like your average bishie or moe cute girl, so if you absolutely need those in your anime, you’re going to find a hard time liking this series. The visual effects can also very easily become grating if you’re used to quiet and simply drawn series.

Still, I personally liked this series a lot, even though I’m not easily impressed by romance shows. A glorified harem show it may be, but the visuals, fast pacing and the fact that in eleven episodes, many years pass that allow us a great look at a period of Genji’s life set this series apart from all the others. If you’re looking for something different (and know Japanese or Chinese, since it’s probably going to take a while for this show to get subbed) then this here is a pretty good recommendation.

Storytelling: 9/10
Characters: 8/10
Production-Values: 9/10
Setting: 8/10

Tytania Review – 82,5/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews, Tytania



Tytania had some massive expectations working against it when it first aired. It’s supposed to be the spiritual successor to the Legend of Galactic Heroes, one of the rumoured best anime ever made (yeah, yeah, I’m going to watch that one some day). These are expectations it obviously couldn’t live up to, but if you watch it as a regular series, then it’s got quite a few charms.

Tytania is a Space Opera, but instead of going for the flashy overpowered mecha action scenes, it’s got a completely different focus, and instead becomes some sort of political thriller. It’s basically a man vs. empire type story and most of the series is dedicated to making it seem plausible why such a huge empire is able to fail such a seemingly simple task of capturing rebels. Corruption and inner-coutry politics for a large part of this series’ themes, and those who are looking for action are going to be disappointed.

What’s interesting about this show’s characters is that nearly every member of the cast is flawed. There are no mister or miss perfect here, everyone hast at least something of a vice or so, ranging from lazyness to incompetence, a temper or just plain insanity. This is exactly what makes this series so interesting to watch, seeing all of these flawed characters grow and develop (or refusing to develop) but it also makes for a bunch of really boring opening episodes. Seriously, in the first ten or so episodes hardly anything happens, and the show is just establishing the setting that it takes place in.

But what a fascinating setting it turns into. Series about politics always need a while to warm up a while, but when they do you, they create deep and multi-layered countries full of inner struggles where mots people care more about their own agenda than anything else, and in this series a lot of detail went into explaining how exactly the almighty Tytania Empire is going to fall apart.

The show does have its issues, though: the big focus is really the setting and characters, but the storyline is a bit buggy here and there, and one of the most grating flaws is tha the creators like to insert plotholes here and there to keep the story going. The animation is also… unorthodox to say the least. The CG spaceships really don’t look well, and characters are very often deformed when they speak. In exchange though: there is lots of movement in this series: characters’ chins move when they talk, and the show isn’t a collection of still frames, so the creators definitely get credits for trying. And either way, you have to admit that the characters look very stylish and charismatic.

It’s not the most solid season, let alone is it a question whether a second season is going to come along in order to animate the rest of the novels that this series is based on, but nevertheless it’s a fun watch for those who want something different from hand to hand (or mecha to mecha) combat. You should often take this show with a grain of sand, but it raises many good points and the characters are definitely fun to watch.

Storytelling: 7/10
Characters: 9/10
Production-Values: 8/10
Setting: 9/10

Druaga no Tou ~The Sword of Uruk~ Review – 80/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews



The Sword of Uruk is the continuation to the surprisingly good Aegis of Uruk, which aired last year. It left us with quite a cliff-hanger, and it’s in any case worth the watch to see how everything plays out in the end. There are quite a few surprises along the way, but somehow the Sword just doesn’t have the charms of of the Aegis.

But before that, you really have to admire the time that went into developing the background for this series. Six months have passed since first season, and this shows in the character-development. The setting, which sounded so innocent and playful in the first season develops into one of epic proportions, and this really is a series of plot twists. For a fantasy series, the plot’s been quite complex and imaginative, which is something I can really enjoy.

However, at the same time I just don’t feel the things that made the original series great. The Aegis of Uruk was a very varied series: there was an excellent combination between silly adventures, character-development and plot. The Sword of Uruk is much more formulaic, though: the first five episodes or so are silly adventures, and after that the comedy stops completely to make room for the ever increasing drama. It just doesn’t feel balanced at all.

the first season had lots of interesting sites to explore, but only one episode of the second season really made an impression on me like the first season did: the house of the dead. This show succeeds more than ever as a fantasy series, but as an adventure one, it fails to impress, which is a bit of a shame, considering the first season. The ending especially shows this, as it’s a bit too much of a formulaic cheese-fest.

Still, there’s lots to like left in this show. The characters still are as charming as they ever were, especially since they already had a season’s worth of development on their resumes and the animation looks as solid as ever. The second season definitely stands out for different reasons than the first one, but it’s still pretty impressive, although not the charming series it once was.

Storytelling: 7/10
Characters: 8/10
Production-Values: 8/10
Setting: 9/10

Kodomo no Omocha Review – 90/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews



One thing that I noticed after having watched lots of different anime is that gets harder and harder to find series that seriously surpass their own genre. Nevertheless, here is one such series: Kodomo no Omocha is without a doubt and by far the best shoujo romantic comedy I have ever seen. And in fact, aside from Nodame Cantabile I can’t think of any romantic comedy that made a bigger impression on me. I’m still amazed at how this series doesn’t just evade just about every pitfall that so many others of its genre fall in, but it manages to be consistently awesome for no less than 102 episodes!

Both in the romance and comedy department, this series delivers. The comedy always feels fresh, and the show exactly knows when to stop repeating its jokes in order to prevent them from getting stale. What makes the comedy especially enjoyable is the incredible amounts of energy that went into it. Sana surely is someone with at least some form of ADHD, but because of her incredibly bubbly personality the show stays fun from beginning to end. The side characters are also absolutely wonderful. I especially liked Sana’s mom and her antics.

The biggest fear you’d obviously have for such an incredibly long series is the tendency of those series to delve into long, long strings of fillers, but his show manages to avoid that very nicely. There are only about six pure fillers throughout the series: three recaps (which you can pretty much skip without any consequences) and three episodes which take place in some sort of bizarre parallel universe of the series. The latter belong to some of the funniest episodes of the entire series.

The rest of the series is divided in about ten arcs, of around ten episodes each, keeping the content from dragging on for too long. Every single arc has a different focus, but all of them contribute to the development of the cast. Even the most insignificant-seeming episodes have their purpose of fleshing out and bringing the cast of this series to life. The creators make excellent use of foreshadowing and flashbacks, and one particular thing they like is introduce one plot-line that only becomes important many episodes later.

In any case, the result is about 100 episodes worth of development put into the cast, and while the pacing of the drama and romance is pretty slow, the very fast paced comedy makes sure that the series never drags on. The show never forgets that it’s supposed to be a romantic comedy, and therefore maintains an excellent combination between funny and serious scenes: it knows exactly when to be funny and when to leave the jokes for a different time. In the end, the series comes together wonderfully, and the final arc of the series is definitely one of the best of the entire series, with a very satisfying ending.

Watching this series really made me wonder why there are so many other similar shoujo romantic comedies which completely miss the mark or have so much trouble to even fill 26 episodes. The only shows that I can think of that can even remotely remain funny through that airtime are Skip Beat and Perfect Girl Evolution. Apart from that, nearly every other shoujo just seems like an uninspired copy of this series. This series has more ideas stuffed into only 13 episodes than others in 26 of them.

Anyway, enough ranting. The only downside to this series appears in the fansubs, which pretty much belong to the worst subs I’ve ever seen, aside from Coalguys, perhaps. Lines are wrongly timed, badly translated and some are even omitted. There are also about ten episodes in which they for some reason completely change the names of the characters to their English counterparts. And while I can understand that this might be an attempt to make the show more accessible to western audiences, however:
1) Then at least be consistent in this and don’t introduce this halfway and give up just as easily.
2) You really know that things are going wrong when a guy named “Takeshi Gojo” turns into “Wootsie Woosie”. Seriously, who found that a good idea?

Still, that’s what official releases are for. For me, Kodocha stands on top of the shoujo genre, and it has been standing there for more than ten years by now. The sheer amount of creativity fully make up for the huge length of this series. Some of the jokes were utterly brilliant, the wide ensemble of facial expressions has been just priceless, and the cast of characters is just wonderful. Akitaro Daichi seriously is one of the best comedy directors out there. Speaking of which, what has he been doing for the past few years? It’s about time he came with another series, isn’t it?

Storytelling: 9/10
Characters: 10/10
Production-Values: 8/10
Setting: 9/10

Shikabane Hime Kuro Review – 87,5/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews, Shikabane Hime



The first season of Shikabane Hime was a very solid build-up, it had great horror, and may have had some pacing issue in the beginning, but it was one of the stories that gets better and better as it goes on. Shikabane Hime Kuro (the continuation), however promised to decline into the standard shounen clichés again, where the two lead characters form a romantic couple and battle a bunch of bad guys in a very overdone way. And in some ways, it did, but with so much style.

Shikabane Hime Kuro is an expert in managing expectations. From the beginning to the end, it sets different expectations for the viewer, only to deliver either something completely different, or exactly what it promised only five times better and more impressive. This leads to bizarre situations, like a couple of very crappy first episodes, followed by a string of awesomeness, followed by a Gainax-ending.

The biggest strength of this series is the cast of characters, though. Because it already had an entire season worth of build-up put into the lead characters, it now really has the chance to play with them and even then the development of the cast doesn’t stop. There’s hardly any episode wasted and both the side characters as the antagonists receive more than adequate attention to flesh out their characters well.

There are lots of nice themes that this series explores. While there are many elements that fall into the shounen clichés in this series, it also provides lots of new and fresh content, with an interesting storyline and plenty of effective mystery. Ouri and Makina are also far away from your typical shounen couple, for once, and a lot of attention in this series if focused on the two of them, trying understand each other, rather than simply one of them serving as a glorified damsel in distress.

But in the end, what it all comes down to is the following: Shikabane Hime is a terrific action-series, that knows exactly what it is. While the first few episodes of Kuro will disappoint, it quickly picks up with a string of gripping action scenes, with some of Gainax’ trademark animation (though used in moderation this time) and a rocking soundtrack, combined with a strong cast and imaginative plot twists that are going to keep you busy throughout the entire rest of the series.

I’m not exactly a fan of shounen series, but I love it when they’re done well, and that’s exactly what Shikabane Hime is. It’s found a very nice combination between style and substance here, and Gainax and Feel did a really good job at bringing the manga alive. It’s also interesting how for a manga adaptation, the creators managed to fit the stories perfectly into 25 episodes: there are hardly any signs of rushed scenes, major plotholes or pacing issues. Exactly what a good manga-adaptation should be.

Storytelling: 9/10
Characters: 9/10
Production-Values: 9/10
Setting: 8/10