Star Crossed Anime

Yozakura Quartet – Hana no Uta

Short Synopsis: Our lead character is human.
Yozakura Quartet, congratulations. You have beaten the entire Autumn Season so far. No other series came close to the creativity you showed in this episode. The characters were incredibly likable, the soundtrack is fantastic, and the animation. Oh god the animation! There are plenty well animated series this season, but this show really takes this one step beyond. This episode featured a festival for example. Take a look at all of the characters in the background: the creators made sure to give all of them a unique look, and they tried to animate all of them as much as possible. Kill La Kill stood out, but it did so in just one way and one style. Kyoukai no Kanata just had a ton of inbetween frames that brought its characters to life. This series however really puts thought into its animation: it toys around with camera angles, it actually moves its camera dynamically, characters physically interact with each other and their environment beyond just swinging swords, punching or firing beams, and it’s all incredibly diverse: the animators experiment with a ton of different stuff here. Especially the second half of this episode was chock full of neat ideas, experiments and really creative movements. There perhaps isn’t as much animation as with the OVAs, but that was to be expected, and there is still plenty to like. This really is a series that excels at showing what’s going on. The only other series that can even get close to it will probably be Kyousogiga.
OP: Oh, the animation. The awesome animation!
Potential: 100%

Gingitsune

Short Synopsis: Our lead character can talk to a fox spirit.
Too… many… great series… this season! I was hoping that Gingitsune would just be one of those forgettable youkai series without much ambition, but no. They just had to make this one incredibly charming series. It’s still a really simple show: a girl suddenly lives with her father at a shrine and suddenly she sees a fox spirit who can talk with a god. She’s the only one who can, and so she becomes its spokesperson. That’s all, nothing special, and similar things have been done many times before. But that fox. I LOVE that fox. He’s all sorts of adorable. He’s this big cuddly teddybear who is this old fart and suddenly realizes he has to be commanded around by this bratty teenager. He’s just wonderful to watch and he synergizes with all characters he’s able to interact with. The female lead, she’s not bad either. She’s bratty, but she too is developed and she learns of her mistakes. She’s engaging enough as a female lead and as the spokesperson of that awesome fox. I know my taste is weird!
OP: Strange animation choices, but I see here enough hints to know that this show will have enough material for 13 episodes.
ED: Awww.
Potential: 85%

Walkure Romanze

Short Synopsis: Our lead character likes horses.
I… just…. what did I just watch? Sigh, dear Walkure Romanze: if you want to have fanservice, fine. Find some way to add it naturally or something. Do not throw in a horse that has a craving for young girl’s skirts. I’d really wish that I didn’t have to tell you this, but unfortunately these series still exist. This entire episode felt like a slap to the face to be honest. The entire setting doesn’t make any sense, as it seems entirely devoted to jousting, and nothing else, and it throws in this inconsequential romance subplot featuring an entire cast of characters with the IQs that many horses can beat easily. The horse was the most bizarre part, due to how well it was drawn at times. Heck, the creators even emoted this animal, with the result that it looked even more rapey than it already was. This really is one to pass up here…
OP: Bland in every way.
ED: Yeah yeah, just give any more obvious hints that this is going to be a harem by putting the entire female cast in wedding dresses…
Potential: 0%

Little Busters Refrain

Short Synopsis: Our lead character is a high schooler.
Yes! Yes! Now this is much more like it! This is what I’ve been waiting for. You know, for as bad as Little Busters was at times, there was one thing that it always did really well: friendship. It sounds cheesy, but it managed to create this tight group of friends who spend their high school days together and have a really tight emotional bond with each other, and this time it’s a reasonably sized one, rather than the usual four or five that you see everywhere. That point was used really well in this first episode of Refrain, as it had a bit of silliness and drama that played off it surprisingly well. There are bad characters. Good lord, there are bad characters. But thankfully we’re all done with their arcs now and we can start to focus on the good ones now.
OP: Lots and lots of hints that things are gonna end bad.
ED: The entire episode was chock full of hints that things were going downhill. So why such a cheerful ED here? It’s not even a good song.
Potential: 80%

Phi Brain Season 3

Short Synopsis: Our lead character solves puzzles.
I’m not going to deny: I thought this episode was awesome. It’s finally done something that it should have done long ago in its second season, but never got around to: focus on Jin, Kaitou’s mentor, who was one of the most interesting characters of the first season. Finally they’re taking his development further, and it seems like he will be a central character in this third season, as opposed to being completely nonexistent in the second. Like the second season, this start again was quite strong with great character-designs and atmosphere, plus the characters work together really well again. HOWEVER, I KNOW THIS SERIES. Please, Phi Brain: make good use of your time for once. The first season was excused to experiment a bit, but not anymore. Actually spend your time well developing your characters, and make the conflict worthwile. Don’t use such a stupid motivation in which characters just can’t think straight. It’s very unusual for a show of your caliber to get so many episodes. Now actually use them!
OP: Very polished. Perhaps not as good as the first OP, but still works quite well.
ED: The song is a bit too bright and cheerful here…
Potential: 75%

Meganebu

Short Synopsis: Our lead character wears glasses.
“Well, there are a ton of different series coming out today, so let me just quickly watch this random bishie show and get things over with so that I can focus on other stuff… holy crap what the hell am I watching?!” – Seriously, just the title “Meganebu”, or glasses club, is not enough to prepare you for what this series is. This isn’t just a series about a bunch of guys who started a club about glasses. This is about a bunch of morons whose entire universe revolves around the damn things. It’s incredibly camp and ridiculously cheesy, not to mention completely pointless. This show is bonkers, of the kind of “so bad it’s good”. Also for some reason it has very creative camera angles.
ED: Lots of cheese and bright colours.
Potential: 20%

Hajime no Ippo – Third Season

Short Synopsis: Our lead character boxes.
For this new season I did wonder: what can the creators still add, after nearly 100 episodes. Then this episode started off with a story about Ippo’s past and nearly made me cry. Hajime no Ippo at this time is a project that has been going on for nearly ten years now, and it’s interesting to see how it evolved over time. This third series is a little less pimped up than the second season (less shiny, and the soundtrack is not as over the top), but the boxing matches still are really well done and full of adrenaline. The strength of this show lies in its side characters, of which there was very little in this episode, but there were plenty of hints for things to come. One thing that did strike me here is how fast the pacing was: the episode went from backstory, to a new challenger to already fighting this challenger, without much of the preparation work that we’ve usually seen from this series: the challenger got like, three lines of introduction before he started fighting. Let’s see whether this is a trend for the new season, or something purposefully needed for this fight.
OP: This actually looks gorgeous!
ED: One of the few ‘running’-EDs that actually work.
Potential: 90%

White Album 2

Short Synopsis: Our lead character dates an idol.
Before I start talking about the actual episode, I want to talk about this series’ pedigree. The first two seasons of White Album (or the adaptation of the first game, explaining why this series is called White Album 2, even though it’s the third season) were made by completely different people: a crew from Seven Arcs brought it to life, and for that they decided to go into a completely unique direction that challenged the way we look at harem and idol series. It was incredibly annoying, yet so satisfying in the end. If you’re a fan of that style: forget about it for White Album 2. Now, the director: Seiya Numata. I really am a big fan of his, as an animator. He has this kind of energy that you hardly find with any other animator out there, not to mention that he is completely crazy. His series and episodes are always incredibly fun to watch. Now, if you are also a fan of him: forget about it for White Album 2. It’s not crazy in any single way, and neither is the animation very impressive. Satelite in general seems to be a Studio where the general rule is that the more money they throw at it, the better it looks, without much focus on the talents of individual animators. Having said that though, this series does set itself apart from most other high school romances, in the way that it has an actually sensible and intelligent male lead. And with that I don’t mean the snarky kind who sprouts quirky one-liners that come out of a novel, but it’s someone who uses his head, he’s great at organizing, and connecting people. The female lead also sounds like she didn’t have her head lobotomized, which is always good. It’s not perfect though, because especially the minor cast still consists out of one-dimensional idiots, but it’s something. This is a series that takes itself entirely serious, with no comedy whatsoever, however you can see Satelight’s love for music in this return quite obviously, and that too works quite well.
Potential: 80%

Teekyu, Season 3

Short Synopsis: Our lead character are supposed to play tennis.
Ooh, Teekyu. You still don’t make an ounce of sense, and I love you for it. At the point of season 3 you still don’t show any signs of slowing down, andthis episode brought us all sorts of randomness from ski lift to chihuahuas. This series still consists out of a bunch of talented animats just having random fun and playing around, and it also helps that the jokes in this series that DO make sense are actually quite good. I’m not that bitter that this was extended to a third season.
OP: What the hell man?
Potential: 75%

Sekai de Ichiban Tsuyoku Naritai!

Short Synopsis: Our lead character “wrestles” in public.
What can I say? This show is just outright porn. Karuta gets Chihayafuru, Go gets Hikaru no Go, Football gets Giant Killing, Shougi gets Shion no OU. And then wresling gets to do with this vapid excuse of a show. Har har, it’s funny because it looks like they’re having sex! I mean, what’s there to say about it? I could spare some words about the whole set-up perhaps, because that also is just an incredible sellout. With the premise of this series being hot girls having sex with each other under the pretense of wrestling, the creators had to find some excuse to get enough of them in there. Their solution? Idols, making this even more of an insult to the sport. The female lead is basically incredibly stupid and ignorant which leads her to just have a match with a professional wrestler without knowing anything at all about the sport, in the middle of a huge audience. In a way this is a good symbol at how the idol business has spiralled out of control at this point, and how idols have forced their way into places that they totally don’t belong with their cameos, just because they’re famous and that their loyal fanbase will basically just support them no matter what, to the dismay of people who don’t have anything to do with them. But you know the thing with parodies, right, Sekai? It’s not a parody if you’re just adhering to the things you’re supposed to make fun of.
OP: Bland song, bland visuals that just show a bunch of bad wrestling scenes.
ED: Just reverting back to the idol part isn’t going to save you here, guys.
Potential: 0%

Ace of Diamond

Short Synopsis: Our lead character is a pitcher.
So, did this series live up to the incredibly high standards that the baseball genre has set in the past? Nah, it’s just a Major-clone, and not really a good one at that. The creators here need to lookup the meaning of “laying it on too thick”, because that was exactly what they were doing in this episode. There is a ton of overacting, but the biggest problem is that it’s got a Marty Stu as a main character, as much as this show tries to hide it. He may make mistakes, but this series always points at him as being right, despite being a brat and making a ton of mistakes, and you also have the strange paradox in which the guy really values teamwork above anything, yet stands at the center of everything. It’s like “teamwork is awesome! As long as I’m the center”. The only redeeming factor here is how this series showed the difference between small baseball teams and the top tier of teams and it at least slightly tried to stay away from the “underdogs good established players bad” cliche. It nearly failed at even that though, but thankfully that catcher and manager ended up saving it.
OP: Generic cheesy opener
ED: The song is generic, but at least the art style is interesting
Potential: 30%

Strike the Blood

Short Synopsis: Our lead character is a vampire who threatens to nknowingly destroy the world.
This turned out to be another one of the bad series this season, unfortunately. At first it looked like it might have potential, but there is one thing that really holds it back: its chronic lack of creativity whatsoever. This entire episode was cobbled up with cliches from other stories without any attempt to turn them into something new. Everything here was done before thousands of times, which made for a really, really boring first episode. And they’re not even the good cliches, but the lazy cliches, varying from the riduclously complicated universe rules in order to give the main character special powers while at the same time making him just a normal guy, the way that a panty shot is the biggest source for interaction between the lead male and female, how an international police organization tasked with saving the earth sends a teenaged girl to do this mission, not to mention the amnesia, the generic setting that throws all sorts of monsters just together without any sort of cohesion, the “not any person could block my uber-attack”-cliche, the “I am so stupid that I have no idea that I suck at tracking people”-cliche, the “random assholes who assault a girl”-cliche, and of course the “really sad flashback in the middle of a fire”-cliche (Miss Monochrome did that too, you know). Add that all together and you have a really boring show.
ED: Generic fight scenes and music that was just copied and pasted.
Potential: 0%

Log Horizon

Short Synopsis: Our lead character is stuck in an MMORPG.
After .Hack and Sword Art Online, here comes the next series about people stuck in an MMORPG. What sets it aside from these two is that it by far takes itself the least serious. Of course there is a solid storyline behind it and all, but a lot of time in this episode was spent on wise-cracking jokes and characters acting quirky, or looking cool while trying to fight monsters. It is much lighter than Sword Art Online by not making an as big of a deal of what happens when you die, and it’s much less deep in its themes than .Hack//Sign was for example. There are still some issues of charcters taking certain things surprisingly serious, like an assassin who talks and acts like an honorable ninja that makes you wonder how she behaved in normal life…), but yeah if you like the banter between the characters then this can be quite fun. Unfortunately for me, that banter often annoyed me and the only good jokes were the ones it made about its setting, how it deconstructed some overused MMORPG cliches with its tongue in its cheek. Most of the jokes though are characters repeating their quirks over and over, and they’re not even funny quirks.
OP: Hilariously cheesy engrish. I did not expect an OP with this intensity, though.
ED: Aagh, and they still come with an ED that has been copied and pasted from every other generic ED out there.
Potential: 65%

Diabolik Lovers

Short Synopsis: Our lead character is stuck in a house full of vampires.
Ah, nearly forgot to check this one out because it aired a few weeks earlier than the rest of the series. Its episodes are only fifteen minutes long, so why not? Diabolik Lovers turned out to be… a really weird horror series. I’m not kidding, the entire premise of this show is that a girl enters a house full of six vampires who start assaulting her, all while looking incredibly creepy. This goes back to the strange amount of occurrences of rapey fantasies that you see all over anime and manga, which I still don’t quite get. But yeah, the bishies are hot and mysterious. The big problem here is that every character so far is a one-dimensional stereotype without any hints of more, so this one definitely isn’t going to win any awards. Good soundtrack, though.
ED: Actually not a bad ED for a horror series.
Potential: 0%

Yuusha Blahblah

Short Synopsis: Our lead character is a hero.
Oh my god. What the hell was that? I originally wasn’t really looking out for this one or anything, but I was not prepared for how phenominally BAD the direction of this series would be. I mean holy crap, the director of htis show did just about everything wrong. You really have to try to be this awful. From the outside it doesn’t look that way, because the series does seem to have quite a big budget, but here is the thing: you do not simply assign all of your inbetweeners to your boob shots. Seriously, the animation in this series is crap, aside from the close up fanservice shots, and it’s so incredibly thickly laid on that it’s not even funny. Either way this is an incredibly sexist series with some of the dumbest female characters out there, but beyond that the acting is incredibly wooden. This show fails to introduce anything, it fails to set any kind of standards for its world, it randomly jumps from one scene to the other without any lead-in and it doesn’t make any attempt at comedic delivery. Add that to the uncanny ability to focus on a girl’s boobs or ass and you’ve got one of the worst directed episodes of the year, especially considering how much budget went into this and was just wasted. The bad thing is that this director is directing TWO series at the same time this season. Who the hell found that a good idea?!
ED: The only way to get any lazier than this ED is to just not record a song for it.
Potential: 0%

Kill La Kill

Short Synopsis: Our lead character is on a quest for revenge.
This is awesome. In the past half year, it was obvious which was the series with the best animation: Shingeki no Kyojin just beat everything. This time though, there are tons of studios who are competing with each other with their best, all in their own ways. We’ve already had Kyoani, Gohands and Toei, here we have Trigger, and we’re most likely going to see awesome stuff from Tatsunoko, Manglobe, A-1, Mappa and Studio Deen. So much eye candy! Kill La Kill also has awesome graphics: the action is just terrific and it just keeps on coming, and on top of that we have the just bizarre sense of humour that the creators have, featuring tons of senseless violence and nudity (both male and female). The story is simple, but it can still grow over 26 episodes to become more than just a “lots of style, no substance”-series. You need to like lots of action though, otherwise this isn’t a series for you. You can also see that Kill La Kill is a throwback to the eighties and nineties, with the absurdly powerful student council that was very often used, combined with the much more cartoonish character designs.
ED: Just some characters, but I expected some more of the song.
Potential: 85%

Golden Time

Short Synopsis: Our lead character enters his first day at college.
Golden Time! Please: keep up the level of this first episode! Don’t be one of those comedies that blow their entire load on their first episode, but keep your wit. Keep your characters at this combination between down to earth and absolutely bonkers! Keep that balance! Keep playing with your mood, the way you did in this episode. Because seriously, if you manage that for your entire run, then we’ve got a comedy classic. If not… then this is just Hataraku Maou-sama with worse animation. This first episode though: really surprised me with how funny it was. The humour was actually quite clever and it *gasp* built up its jokes. It was exceptionally good at delaying its jokes: you knew they were coming, but just delaying it made things even funnier than what they already were. It’s a show with a small budget and not many great animators, but they actually did a pretty good job to make things work. Plus some effective use of the simple soundtrack made the above mentioned mood swings work really well. But yeah: it’s all going to depend on whether they can keep this up or not. There have been plenty and plenty of series that just went downhill after hilarious first episodes. I’d give this show a 50/50 chance of that happening.
OP: Very thickly laid on cheese on the J-Pop.
ED: A bit weird considering the context of the series.
Potential: 80%

Outbreak Company

Short Synopsis: Our lead character is the legendary otaku savior who has to cultivate the simple-minded who know nothing about moe.
In all of the years I’ve been watching these first episodes, I can’t recall any other series that was as blatantly kissing the asses of its own audience as this one. They really went out of their way to make this dream as wet as possible without resulting to porn for any otaku watching this series (or at least, what the creators think are otaku…). Escapism at its worst, creating a fantasy world in which the main character’s otaku self is celebrated, all because he once got rejected for being one (though granted, having watched this guy for an episode, that probably wasn’t the only reason she rejected him). The acting may not be the worst or anything, but here is the thing with this series: to someone who isn’t an otaku like myself, all this series does is reafferm, if not worsen, the stereotypes that I have of otakus. The male lead is a really unlikable guy, and if they just keep going on about how he’s living inside his own world, rejecting reality, then this show really is not helping to lessen the biases people have here.
OP: Bland J-pop, nothing outstanding.
ED: Again bland J-pop.
Potential: 0%

Nagi no Asakura

Short Synopsis: Our lead character lives in a house under the sea.
Whoooaaaaaa: the setting for this series is awesome! It’s like this child’s dream come true, in which these people live in the middle of the sea with houses and everything, inbetween all of the fish and other sea creatures, and the creators made this whole culture based on that life, including a whole folklore and magic that’s quite creative and fits in perfectly. At the same time you can really see that this is a Mari Okada series, with already a good focus on drama. It’s not perfect though. I still can’t get over the character designs: the main character looks like a girl! There’s way too much sparkle in his eyes, and PA Works went a little too far in adding the polish to the characters here. Uchoten Kazoku showed that taking away the shine results in much better character designs. Shading is fine, but too much lighting leads to a plastic effect. Also, did you have to make the female lead so incredibly weak and useless? And this is coming from people who previously worked on the Armed Librarians which spawned some of the strongest female characters out there, so I’m not sure where the hell that came from?
OP: A bland pop song, but the backgrounds are great looking.
ED: Bland pop, but it does fit the undersea motive very well.
Potential: 80%

Kyousogiga

Short Synopsis: Our lead character fights with a giant hammer
Wednesday is the day of excellent graphics! Kyousogiga will only have 10 episodes. Aside that we seem to have an episode 0, 5,5 and 10,5. I’m not sure what the latter two are, but episode 0 is basically the first ova. I guess it makes sense from a future perspective: this way you have the entire Kyosogiga in just one series, rather than a confusing bunch of OVAs. If you haven’t seen it yet, then this is the perfect chance: it’s great! And I’ll be waiting for it next week to start for real.
Potential: 90%

Coppelion

Short Synopsis: Our lead characters are the only ones who can survive in a post apocalyptic Tokyo
Coppelion… actually turned out to be really good! Beyond just looking amazing, the characters are also really well acted. The whole episode played out in this post-apocalyptic wasteland, and it really brought forth the cold and empty atmosphere amidst the beauty of the ravaged scenery. The characters are teenaged girls, but the creators gave a good reason for them to stand in the spotlight, rather than adults, and more importantly: they were well acted. They had teenaged quirks, but they also had much more sides than that and knew how to balance them around. The narrative also rocks, and it built up to this really good climax there at the end. This could very easily become GoHands’ best work at this rate.
ED: Holy crap! This ED rocks! Angela is really in her element here as a singer.
Potential: 90%

Kyoukai no Kanata

Short Synopsis: Our lead character meets a girl with superpowers.
The trailer hinted at gorgeous graphics, and this show delivered: the animation here is really good and the fights look wonderful. It however failed to show another aspect of this series: the comedy. Oh boy, it’s mostly bad. A lot of this episode was a ditzy stupid girl bantering with a snarky mellow male lead. Gee, Kyoani, I wonder where you got the inspiration for that one! These characters are like near carbon copies of the stereotypes that they usually go for in their series, only this time it’s heavily inspired by Bakemonogatari. And unlike Hyouka, the chemistry isn’t really good here. On the other hand, there were lots of hints to a more serious future (but then again, Tamako Market did that too…). So yeah, the question is whether the animation, plot and the rest of the characters will be good enough to excuse this banter.
OP: The song is nothing special. The animation is really good though.
ED: Great visual direction for an ED here. Lovely use of colors and shots.
Potential: 75%

Super Seisyun Brothers

Short Synopsis: Our lead characters are a bunch of twins and best friends who hang out together.
You know what? For a 4-minute episoded series, this wasn’t half bad. Sure, it wasn’t anything amazing, but unlike Miss Monochrome, it actually had characters worth watching. It’s basically about these four characters who all look similar, yet are different when you get to know them. This series seems to be about the differences between these four. And you know, that’s not a bad premise to base your series on if you’re just doing a short one. Sure, they talk in stereotypes and nothing really stood out, but considering the usual quality of these kinds of series:, it’s actually watchable.
ED: Simple, but it works: my eyes aren’t figuratively bleeding for once.
Potential: 40%

Miss Monochrome

Short Synopsis: Our lead character is an android who wants to be an idol.
Yeah, moving on. This is another one of those crappy 5-minute series that serve no point. There’s no context, just about this girl with a tragic past who wants to be an idol. Way to cash in on things, eh? It tries to make jokes, but the delivery of them is some of the worst I’ve seen in quite a while.
Potential: 0%