And as if nothing happened last week, this episode just continues building further upon the excellent setting and atmosphere that this show already had. While last week was just too silly, this episode had a much better balance between light hearted stuff and dark material.
This episode also introduces this noblewoman, and I really like how smug her acting was. The creators really nailed that air of importance around her. Milia had to get dressed up for her again, but this time it at least makes more sense. This time it fits into the setting, rather than having Millia just pull a maid costume out of her ass.
In terms of building up, Fam’s past was nice, and Milia’s home country also got thrown into an interesting direction here. I did however spot a number of recycled cells here and there. In particular the CG overviews of the past episodes were used again here. That’s good of course, since they are gorgeous. Even Porfy no Nagai Tabi, which stood out for some of the best background art out there, reused its backgrounds. But this show looks so damn pretty that I really wish that the characters would visit some more different sites.
Rating: * (Good)]]>
Fate/Zero – 08
This episode showed three fights right through each other: Emiya versus Kayneth, Kirei versus Irisviel and Maiya, and Caster versus Saber and Lancer. I especially liked the middle one, in which two vastly inferior fighters tried to stop stall time and prevent Kotomine Kirei from reaching Emiya. This guy really is brutal when he wants to, and it’s probably only because he was interested in the two of them that they got away with it.
The blob fight also was pretty interesting. Emiya had a very clear plan on defeating Kayneth, and Kayneth was just way too cocky. His pride is by far his biggest flaw, in that he refuses to acknowledge anything other than accomplished magic. He’s like this character who spent way too much time reading books, instead of getting actual combat experience. He relied too much on his tricks to realize the possibility that people might have developed weapons that are designed to take down mages.
The fight against caster though… I don’t really know what to make of that, and it was rather boring. At first Caster is all like “I have you surrounded now, so I’m just going to sit back and give you time to talk about how to defeat me!” and then saber pulled this shiny thing that allowed lancer to charge past these monsters and cut Caster’s book which somehow made the monsters disappear, only to heal afterwards but the monsters didn’t return… I’m not really sure what the creators wanted to do with that battle. In general battles against small armies are really hard to do in anime… and this unfortunately was not a counter example.
Rating: ** (Excellent)]]>
Winter Season Preview – Movie and OVA Edition
DVD Specials
Infinite Stratos Encore: A Sextet Yearning for Love
Summary: “The story centers around the IS Academy: a school for training the pilots of the Infinite Stratos weapon system, which can only be used by females. Candidates plucked from girls from countries all over the world are brought here — as well as one boy named Ichika Orimura. As it turns out, Ichika is “the only male in the world who can use the IS.” “ – (Taken from ANN)
Type: BD/DVD Special
Comments: Watching the Infinite Stratos TV-series felt like watching one big middle finger. “You want to see an exciting mecha-series? Hah! Too bad. Here are some unfunny harem antics!” With a title like this, the creators really dropped all pretense.
Hoshizora e Kakaru Hashi
Summary: “Kazuma’s brother Ayumu needs to recuperate from an illness, so they move from the city to a rural mountain village. They plan to board at their father’s inn, Yorozuyo, but get lost on their way. Wandering in the mountains, Kazuma stumbles across a girl named Ui Nakatsugawa. It’s the first of many encounters in his new country life.” – (Taken from ANN)
Type: DVD Special
Comments: This was a show that was ridiculously badly acted, based on the first episode that I watched anyways. Apparently this OVA will host an OVA-original character who didn’t appear in the TV-series.
Itsuka Tenma no Kuro Usagi
Summary: “The “reverse school fantasy” light novel series follow an ordinary high school boy named Taito Kurogane who is given a “poison” by a female vampire named Saitohimea, thus changing his life.” – (Taken from ANN)
Type: Special, bundled with Manga
Comments: This OVA will contain manga content that didn’t make it in the anime. Apparently, people could vote on twitter which story they would like to see animated. In any case, I dropped Itsuten quite early on. The thing that stood out to me the most was the name of one of the characters: “Kurenai Gekkou”.
R-15
Summary: “Takuto Akutagawa has a special ability for writing porn novels. He applies to Hirameki Gakuen a high school which only accepts people with “Unique” talent. Now he must chase his dream and direct his classmates to win an interclass competition. All while trying to create the prefect harem.” – (Taken from ANN)
Type: OVA, bundled with Manga
Comments: This show just made no sense whatsoever. It was full of idiots pretending to be geniuses, and most of its attempts at being funny got old really fast for me.
Seitokai Yakuindomo
Summary: “The manga follows a former all-girls school’s student council which has three female members and one sole male representative. “ – (Taken from ANN)
Type: OVA, Bundled with Manga Volume
Director: Hiromitsu Kanasawa
Script: Makoto Nakamura
Comments: This show surely does have a lot of OVAs and DVD-specials, doesn’t it? Ah well, I stopped caring about this long ago.
Major
Summary: “The OVA project will adapt the thus-far-unanimated World Series arc and the story’s illusive final matchup, while the new book will let fans see the last pitch in the manga. The project promises the return of the “Golden Battery” in America. “ – (Taken from ANN)
Type: OVA, bundled with Compilation Manga
Comments: So this truly seems to be the final installment of Major, after god knows how many season and manga volumes. I actually attempted to watch the first season of Major, when Goro was still a kid, but I didn’t really like it. It was just way too shounen.
Franchise Movies and OVAs
Inazuma Eleven GO: Kyuukyoku no Kizuna Griffon
Summary: “he Inazuma Eleven GO storyline is set one decade after the first Inazuma Eleven storyline.” – (Taken from ANN)
Type: Movie
Comments: Well, this show also has started the tradition of having a new movie released every year, like a ton of other successful kids’ shows are doing. I tried to watch the GO Television series, but in the end I just got turned off by the dry and uninteresting characterization. Kids movies don’t have to be bad, as long as they put enough attention in the character department.
First-Glance Potential: 20%
Lupin III: Chi no Kokuin Eien no Mermaid
Summary: “Arsene Lupin III is the grandson of the master thief Arsene Lupin. With his cohorts Daisuke Jigen and Goemon Ishikawa XIII and his love interest Fujiko Mine, he pulls off the greatest heists of all time while always escaping the grasp of Inspector Koichi Zenigata.” – (Taken from ANN)
Type: TV-Special
Comments: Okay, I might have mislead people a bit with some of my previous statements. As it turns out, the new Lupin Television series will just be a standalone TV-special, just like the thirty previous ones. It appears that I’m not the only one who made this mistake, so let me warn all the other preview writers out there who make use of Moonphase: Moonphase also puts standalone TV-specials in the TV-series category. Pay attention to that in order to prevent misleading everyone. In any case, this seems to be yet another one of those Lupin Specials. If you liked those, you’ll probably like this one, but I’m not really interested in it.
First-Glance Potential: 40%
Ongoing OVA and Movie Series
Kiss X Sis 06
Summary: “Keita has two older step-sisters, Ako and Riko, but since they aren’t related by blood, they love him in a lustful way. After a mishap at school, Ako and Riko finally confess their love to him. Keita dislikes the thought of seeing them other then brother and sister, but as he tries to enter the same school as his sisters, he slowly becomes attracted to them.” – (Taken from ANN)
Type: Movie
Director: Munenori Nawa
Comments: Just end it already!
First-Glance Potential: 0%
Queen’s Blade OVA
Summary: “The stories are set after the Queen’s Blade competition of Hobby Japan’s original games but before the Rebellion. They take place after the storyline of Queen’s Blade Utsukushiki Toushi-tachi video anime series.” – (Taken from AniDB)
Type: OVA
Director: Morino Yousei
Comments: Nothing to see here. Moving on…
First-Glance Potential: 0%
Higurashi no Naku Koro Ni Kira – 03 & 04
Summary: “With things such as story out of the way, Higurashi cranks up the fanservice with Kira, a new OVA series to commemorate the series’ 10th anniversary, featuring nail-biting situations such as Rika and Satoko becoming magical girls to battle evil magic crime syndicates with the help of their trusty squad of cheerleaders, among other things.” – (Taken from MAL)
Type: OVA
Director: Hideki Tachibana
Script: Toshifumi Kawase
Comments: Ugh.. there’ll be two more episodes before this will be over. At this point, I’ve given up all hope.Toshifumi Kawase is one of the best writers that Studio Deen currently has, but he definitely isn’t trying for this one. On top of that, they still haven’t gotten rid of the abysmal Hideki Tachibana as the director.
First-Glance Potential: 0%
Morita-San wa Mukuchi – 05
Summary: “Morita Mayu, a high school girl. She is extremely reticent and her silence and habit of looking at people’s eyes straightly sometimes cause misunderstanding. The reason behind it is not because she doesn’t like to talk nor because she has nothing to say. The reason she rarely speaks is due to the fact she thinks too much before speaking, thus losing the timing to speak altogether. But she lives a happy school life with her classmates.” – (Taken from MAL)
Type: OVA
Director: Hayashi Naotaka
Script: Hiroshi Satou
Comments: Im getting a bit tired of these creators. Morita-San wa Mukuchi would have been an enjoyable slice of life series if the creators actually put some effort into making it enjoyable. Right now this just feels like reading a random 4-koma over an audio book.
First-Glance Potential: 10%
Yuri-Seijin Naoko-san – 02
Summary: “Naoko, an alien maid, accompanies Misuzu and her friend Hii on her way to school to guard her from a groper that has been sighted on the neighborhood.” – (Taken from ANN)
Type: OVA
Director: Tetsuya Takeuchi
Comments: At least, I think that this will be some sort of continuation of the first 6-minute OVA. The Internet is being very vague on that. In any case, the first OVA was very random and also very wrong in its content material. It’s impressive that it was mostly created by just one guy, but it wasn’t exactly good entertainment.
First-Glance Potential: 20%
Carnival Phantasm – Third Season
Summary: “In this show you’ll see parodies and new stories loosely based on Type-Moon’s original works like Melty Blood, Fate/Stay Night, Tsukihime and more.” – (Taken from MAL)
Type: Collection of short OVAs
Director: Seiji Kishi
Script: Makoto Uezu
Comments: I just don’t get this series. Carnival Phantasm really is meant for hardcore fans of the Type Moon universe, and not for people who maybe saw a few series here and there of it. If you’re not a fan of every single series, this will just end up as a collection of very, very bad jokes.
First-Glance Potential: 30%
Hakuouki Hekketsu-Roku – 05
Summary: “: Based on Idea Factory’s romance adventure game: Yukimura Chizuru has come to Kyoto looking for her father, a doctor who has gone missing. While there, she witnesses a fight between an Oni and the Shinsengumi. Taking her into custody, the Shinsengumi debates on what to do with Chizuru when they discover that she is the daughter of the doctor they are also looking for. The Shinsengumi then takes Chizuru along on their search after the missing doctor, from adventures to adventures.” – (Taken from ANN)
Type: OVA
Director: Osamu Yamazaki
Comments: Osamu Yamazaki is a bit of a mystery to me. I mean this in the way that the series he directs have no similarities whatsoever to each other. His adaptation of Toward the Terra was amazing, but after that he always just missed something.
First-Glance Potential: 30%
Saiyuki Gaiden – 03
Summary: “500 years before Saiyuki, a heretic child with golden eyes is brought to Heaven and given into the reluctant care of a minor deity, Konzen, nephew of the Merciful Goddess Kanzeon Bosatsu. Konzen eventually names him “Goku”. Goku befriends two other minor gods, Marshal Tenpou and General Kenren of the Western Army of Heaven, and a boy who seems to be his age, the War Prince Nataku. Though Goku is happy in his new home, Heaven is not kind to heretics.” – (Taken from )
Type: Movie
Director: Naoyuki Kuzuya
Script: Kazuya Minekura
Comments: So, how has Saiyuuki Gaiden been doing? This will be the third and last installment of this OVA, and while I didn’t check it out due to time restraints, I guess that this one is interesting for Saiyuki fans.
First-Glance Potential: 50%
New Releases
Sacred Seven: Shirogane no Tsubasa
Summary: “The special edition will focus on the fighting between the Sacred Takers Alma and Night, as well as the fight with Kenmi from Night’s point of view. The re-edited version will have new scenes, particularly of Night’s past, and a new dialogue recording.” – (Taken from ANN)
Type: Compilation Movie
Comments: Oh dear god why!? The TV-series already was mediocre, and now they want to make a recap movie to add even more insult to the injury? The new content is nice and all, but it will probably just amount to three minutes of new footage or something. I also love how silly the promo art for this show is. Like, the one who drew it couldn’t believe how silly it was what he had to draw.
First-Glance Potential: 0%
Waza no Tabibito
Summary: “The story centers around Tekuni Depagaa, a girl who embarks on a journey to train and become a fighting master known as a “wazabito.”” – (Taken from AniDB)
Type: OVA
Director: Matsuena Shun
Other Notable Staff: Tenmon (Music)
Comments: Tenmon behind the music is very solid, considering he also did the music of ef, and most of the Makoto Shinkai movies. Matsuena Shun meanwhile wrote, directed, designed and produced this thing by himself. Unfortunately however, one look at the trailer should tell that the visuals in this thing will be… weird. It’s got the most abysmal character designs, the animation of the 3D models is really poor. And yet it looks like it’ll get some stunning background art.
First-Glance Potential: 50%
K-On
Summary: “The movie will depict a story not told in the television series, even though it will follow the five female members of Sakuragaoka High School’s light music club while they are still attending high school. “ – (Taken from ANN)
Type: Movie
Director: Naoko Yamada
Script: Reiko Yoshida
Comments: Well, it had it coming: K-On has gotten itself a movie. Overall I don’t care about the TV-series at all, although I do admit that a movie could be interesting if there’s… something actually happening. This was the main reason I didn’t continue with any of the TV-series: it gave me no reason to.
First-Glance Potential: 50%
Holy Knight
Summary: “The “dramatic school (romantic) fantasy” centers around an ordinary orphan named Mizumura who goes to a missionary school in Tokyo. His seemingly normal life changes when a beautiful half-Romanian girl named Lilith suddenly transfers into his school. This timid boy is actually a vampire hunter and the successor of the Romyuarudo lineage. “ – (Taken from ANN)
Type: Movie
Director: Jiro Fujimoto
Storyboard: Hiroyuki Shimazu
Comments: This seems to be the first part of the “cammot” animation project. I have no idea what the rest of the installments of this projects are going to be, but at least I hope that they’ll come with a bit of a more creative story. The trailer itself seems solidly put together. But seriously, couldn’t you have come up with a better premise?
First-Glance Potential: 60%
Dragon Age: Dawn of the Seeker
Summary: “he game is set in Ferelden, one of several countries that makes up the mythical continent of Thedas. The game opens with an animation which details the origins of demonic creatures called the darkspawn, that dwell within the Deep Roads, an underground highway system created by the dwarves long ago, deep beneath the surface of Thedas. Every few hundred years, the darkspawn swarm the surface world in a movement known as a Blight. Beginning with the first Blight, Thedas relied on the legendary order of warriors known as the Grey Wardens to drive the darkspawn back. Dragon Age: Origins begins on the eve of Thedas’s fifth Blight.” – (Taken from Wikipedia)
Type: Movie
Director: Fumihiko Sori
Other Notable Staff: Daisuke Nakayama (Character Designs), Tetsuya Takahashi
Comments: If only because of the character designs, I’m going to watch this movie. It’s actually got the same character designer as Mahou Shoujotai! The soundtrack will also be awesome, coming from the same guy who composed all of the soundtracks for the Marvel-series. Only the director will be a bit lackluster: it’s the director of Vexxile and TO, which both had potential, but had rather weak storylines.
First-Glance Potential: 70%
Minori Scramble
Summary: “The story revolves around Tamaki Kakegawa, a fifth grade girl whose father is a penguin researcher. As such, Tamaki is constantly surrounded by penguins and has grown to hate them. In order to cure Tamaki’s hatred of penguins, a ‘penguinoid’ named Minori is built to befriend her.” – (Taken from Wikipedia)
Type: One-Shot OVA
Director: Takuya Nonaka
Comments: The trailer of this one actually looks fun and well directed. At first sight this one may seem like Yuri-Seijin Naoko-san (it’s actually being released together with this series),but Ufo-Table put some good people on this thing, including the director of the second Kara no Kyoukai movie.
First-Glance Potential: 70%
Friends: Mononoke Shima no Naki
Summary: “Naki and Gunjou are friends who live on Mononoke Shima, and they cross paths with a human child. “ – (Taken from ANN)
Type: Movie
Director: Takashi Yamazaki
Script: Takashi Yamazaki
Other Notable Staff: Hirosuke Hamada (Original Creator)
Comments: Here is another interesting one: at first sight this seems like a kiddie movie in 3D. However, it seems that this movie will be based upon a tear-jerker of a story, plus it will feature the main character at different ages. That alone has caught my interest.
First-Glance Potential: 70%
Eiyuu Densetsu: Sora no Kiseki The Animation
Summary: “In the southwest area of the Zemulia Continent, one will find the tiny Liberl Kingdom. A small monarchy that has managed to defy all odds against attempts to overcome them during war. Liberl is split into five regions: Rolent, Bose, Ruan, Zeiss, and Grancel. In the city of Rolent, Cassius Bright has raised two children by himself, Estelle and Joshua. He taught them everything they know himself, and encourages them to sign up to become apprentices in the Bracers Guild. Soon after, however, he receives a letter and has to leave on business, leaving Estelle and Joshua to fend for themselves. While working, they receive notice one day that their father’s airship has gone missing. With this in mind, the two gear themselves up, and set off to find the ship and save their father.” – (Taken from MAL)
Type: Movie
Director: Makoto Tachibana
Script: Makoto Uezu
Comments: Christ, this one just keeps getting delayed. But, it looks like it’ll finally get released on November 25th. Anyway, the story is still the same: the director of Tokyo Magnitude doing another OVA with Kinema Citrus. Looking forward to it.
First-Glance Potential: 85%
Tales of Symphonia the Animation: The United World
Summary: “Two worlds exist, both unaware of the existence of the other. In order for one world to flourish, the other will have to perish. On the doomed world, a Chosen one is send on a journey to restore that world’s mana by awakening the Spirits and becoming an angel. Colette Brunel, the Chosen of Sylvarant, sets out on her journey accompanied by her best friends Lloyd Irving and Genis Sage. As they travel further they meet new friends and even more enemies, while they learn more and more about the truth behind the World Regeneration.” – (Taken from ANN)
Type: OVA
Director: Haruo Sotozaki
Comments: It’s finally time for the final arc of this story to commence. And I must say, Ufo Table did a great job on trying to tell the whole story so far with these small series of OVAs. The previous episodes stood out because they nailed that balance between faitful and creative freedom, doing justice to the games, but also creating their own storyline. In the games, this is around the point where things get a bit less interesting, due to the increase in epicness. I wonder how the creators are planning to use that.
First-Glance Potential: 85%
Rurouni Kenshin: Shin Kyoto-Hen – 01
Summary: “Himura Kenshin is a vagabond with a dark past and sunny disposition. Not a ronin but a rurouni, he was never a samurai, but an assassin of utmost skill in the Meiji restoration, who in the turning point of the war simply walked away. His travels lead him to Tokyo in the 11th year of the Meiji era, where he befriends a female Kendo master, a former thief, a brawler and a doctor all with their own secrets. Together they fight off the enemies surfacing from the dark past that Kenshin cannot escape.” – (Taken from ANN)
Type: Two-Part OVA
Director: Kazuhiro Furuhashi
Script: Mari Okada
Other Notable Staff: Hiro Kaburaki (Episode Director)
Comments: I’m not going to watch the Rurouni Kenshin TV-Series due to the fact that it’s so damn long, but these OVA series? Count me in for that. Tsuioku-hen was brilliant, and this finally shows Kazuhiro Furuhashi doing something other than Gundam again (for the record: this was the guy who, beyond directing Tsuioku-hen, also directed Real Drive, Amatsuki, Hunter X Hunter, Chevalier, and Zipang). On top of that, this time he’s got Mari Okada and the director of Kimi ni Todoke helping him out.
First-Glance Potential: 85%
.Hack//The Movie
Summary: “he story is set in 2024, when children have lived their entire lives since birth in a world connected by networks. A cheerful 14-year-old middle school girl named Sora Yūki has no interest in games, but her friends get her to go into the popular network game “The World.” However, due to “a certain incident” in The World, anomalies start occurring in the real world. “ – (Taken from ANN)
Type: Movie
Director: Hiroshi Matsuyama
Script: Kazunori Ito
Comments: Holy crap, Kazunori Ito will actually return for this movie. He was the one who originally wrote .Hack//Sign, but also shows as Zettai Shounen, Twillight Q’s first episode, wrote the screenplay for all sorts of parts of the Patlabor Franchise (including the second movie!), plus he also wrote the screenplay of the first Ghost in the Shell Movie. This also seems to be much more in the direction of .Hack//Liminality. I mean, it’s 3D and all, but as a fan of the .Hack franchise this is one movie that I’m really looking forward to.
First-Glance Potential: 90%
Kyousogiga
Summary: “???”
Type: Original Net Animation
Director: Rie Matsumoto
Other Notable Staff: Yuki Hayashi (Animation Director, Character Designs), Takashi Kurahashi (Art Design)
Comments: Now this is a very obvious one to keep our eyes out for: Toei doing an anime original ONA, helmed by the director of the surprisingly good and well written Heartcatch Precure Movie. And that’s not everything: on top of that this thing will have the art directors of Ayakashi and Mononoke, and various animators of Heartcatch Precure seem to be returning for this project. This one can get very interesting here. Now ideally, things like this need to get a full fledged TV-series. Experiments like this need more time to really show what they want to do.
First-Glance Potential: 90%
Gyo
Summary: “Someting in Okinawa reeks, and it isn’t long before Tadashi and his girlfriend Kaori realize that the smell are coming from dead fish, which are walking out of the sea. The fish are fused to metal legs and are infected with a disease contractable by humans that was invented as a weapon by the Japanese government. After Kaori is infected, Tadashi goes to find a solution to this putrid takeover, if there even is an answer to be found.” – (Taken from ANN)
Type: One-Shot OVA
Director: Takayuki Hirao
Other Notable Staff: Takuro Takahashi (Character Designs), Junji Ito (Original Creator)
Comments: For some reason this is being released alongside Yuri-Seijin Naoko-San and Minori Scramble. One of these things is not like the others. In any case, I’m very interested in this one-shot horror OVA from Ufo Table. What’s even more interesting is that they put the director of the fifth Kara no Kyoukai movie on it (like, the best movie of the entire series). Beyond that, this guy also directed Futakoi Alternative and even worked on Paranoia Agent. Here is one to look out for.
First-Glance Potential: 95%
Un-Go Episode 0
Summary: “The 45-minute original story will depict the protagonists Shinjūrō and Inga’s first encounter and “reveal the biggest mystery [of the story] in theaters.” “ – (Taken from ANN)
Type: 45-Minute Movie
Director: Seiji Mizushima
Script: Shou Aikawa
Comments: I’m not sure under which section to put this thing, because this is definitely not your average DVD-special. It’s 45 minutes long, and actually gets released in theaters. And Un-Go already was my favorite show of the current Autumn Season. It’s really well written and uses every minute of its airtime. This movie also will show the past of the two main characters, which has been hinted at very heavily to be something special.
First-Glance Potential: 95%
Berserk Ougon Jidai-Hen I: Haou no Tamago
Summary: “A brave young warrior named Guts fights for his fortune as a mercenary on the front lines. A fated encounter unites Guts with the charismatic and deadly young man named Griffith. Leading the rogue soldiers known as the Band of the Hawk, Griffith wields his formidable force like no other. Driven by a quest for status, the Hawks exert military and social prowess the likes of which have never been seen before. The armies of Midland will quake with fear as Griffith and Guts set off on a path that will bring the world to its knees.” – (Taken from MAL)
Type: Movie
Director: Toshiyuki Kabooka
Script: Ichiro Okouchi
Other Notable Staff: Naoyuki Onda (Chief Animation Direction), Yusuke Takeda (Art Direction), Goki Nakamura, , Susumu Hirasawa
Comments: Now this is it. I mean, Berserk having a movie reboot is already one thing. But with Studio 4C! Heck, they even got Susumu Hirasawa to write the theme song for this movie. For the director, they also got a great guy: the guy who directed the “Remaining Sense of Pain”-part of the Batman movie, which was really well directed. My only worry is that the writer of Code Geass will handle the script here, but as long as they follow the manga, there is very little that can go wrong here. Or is the manga’s story too big for three movies?
First-Glance Potential: 100%
]]>
Winter Season Preview
Amagami SS+ Plus
Summary: “A second-year high school boy finds himself uneasy during Christmas time due to an experience in the past. However, this year at Christmas, he gets his last chance to ask out a graduating female senior named Haruka Morishima—or one of several other classmates. The story of the anime will be arranged in an omnibus format, with each heroine getting her own version of the story animated. Each heroine will sing her own version of the ending theme song.” – (Taken from ANN)
Director: Tomoki Kobayashi
Series Composition: Noboru Kimura
Other Notable Staff: Machida Touko (Script)
The Positives: Director Switch. This season will be directed by the director of Sola, Utawarerumono and Tears to Tiara, so let’s hope that this will be a bit less lackluster than the first season, as unlikely as it may sound with that track record.
The Negatives: Just… why? I’m just baffled as to why this series got a continuation, other than AIC milking its moe shows again. The cover art shows the exact same characters as the first season again, even though the arcs I managed to sit through were pretty conclusive. What the hell are they really going to do? Add in even more forced romace? Rewrite the entire series? In any case, I did watch about 10 series of the first Amagami before giving up on it, but at this point I have no idea why I stuck with it so long. It was incredibly forgettable romance that failed to stand out in any way. Can the new series really bring a change in that?
First-Glance Potential: 0%
Zero no Tsukaima Final
Summary: “Meet Louise, a budding magician. The students at the Tristein Academy call her “Zero Louise”, due to her current record of zero successes with magic. In fact, her magic tends to go spectacularly wrong. Now, as an important test of her aptitude for magic, she must summon a familiar to be her servant. At this critical moment, she summons up all her magic and wishes for a familiar that is “devoted, beautiful and powerful”, and gets… Hiraga Saito, an ordinary Japanese boy. It’s difficult to say who is more surprised and dismayed, but the rules don’t allow for second attempts. Louise is stuck with her strange familiar, and he with her.” – (Taken from ANN)
Director: Yoshiaki Iwasaki
Series Composition: Noboru Yamaguchi
The Positives: The series composition will actually be handled by the writer of the Zero no Tsukaima manga. The director did work on a bunch of good series like Sky Girls and Wagaya no Oinarisama…
The Negatives: But unfortunately the same guy worked on just as many lesser shows, like Ookamisan and Twin Angel. And really, the thought of two Kugimiya Rie shows at the same time… with the two characters who started off her infamy. Louise was the first Shana clone out there, and while I blame Shana for creating a really obnoxious stereotype, I blame Zero no Tsukaima even more for adhering to it and making it even more popular.
First-Glance Potential: 0%
High School DXD
Summary: “The story follows Issei Hyōdō, a dim-witted, lecherous second-year high school student who is killed by a girl on his first date ever. Issei is reincarnated as a devil, and from that day forward, he serves as an underling of Riasu, a high-level devil who is also the prettiest girl on Issei’s campus. “ – (Taken from ANN)
Director: Tetsuya Yanagisawa
Series Composition: Takao Yoshioka
The Positives: Um, Takao Yoshioka usually isn’t that bad of a scriptwriter, with the series composition of Elfen Lied, Daimaou and Sky Girls under his name… usually…
The Negatives: What do you want from me?! The url of this show’s website is called “Harem King”!
First-Glance Potential: 0%
Papa no Iu Koto o Kikinasai!
Summary: “Segawa had just gotten into college and settled into his first semester with new friends, but the plane that his older sister and her husband were riding went missing. As a result, Segawa has to watch over the middle school girl Sora, the fifth-grader Miu, and the kindergartener Hina in his tiny 3-meter-by-4-meter (9-foot-by-12-foot) apartment. “ – (Taken from ANN)
Director: Itsuro Kawasaki
Series Composition: Naruhisa Arakawa
Other Notable Staff: Tomohiro Matsu (Original Creator)
The Positives: So here we have the generic moe romantic comedy of the season… only it’s directed by a guy who normally handles action series: Itsuro Kawasaki.
The Negatives: Most of his series though miss something, and he only really nailed a series with Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu, which did have a very strong source material. I really cannot say the same for this show though. It feels like Rou Kyuu Bu II or something. The entire premise is dedicated to pandering to a certain type of audience. Naruhisa Arakawa is the same: she wrote a lot, but ultimately most of these works are rather generic. With the big exception of the Legend of Black Heaven, but that unfortunately seems completely different.
First-Glance Potential: 0%
Baby, Please Kill Me
Summary: “A four panel series about the not-so-ordinary school life of hyper Yasuna, her (unwilling) partner-in-crime Sonya the assassin and Agiri, a ninja with highly questionable skills.” – (Taken from ANN)
Director: Yoshiki Yamakawa
Series Composition: Hideki Shirane
Other Notable Staff: Shinya Hasegawa (Character Designs)
The Positives: The character designer of Utena, wut? The director isn’t anything special, but he’ll probably make this mildly fun.
The Negatives: I still haven’t forgiven Hideki Shirane for ruining Yumekui Merry. And it’s good that this doesn’t have a serious story, because he seems to be really bad at that (Aria The Scarlet Ammo, anyone?). In any case, this seems like it’ll be typical JC Staff: typical but ultimately unfunny antics by moe young girls. We’ve got enough of those series already.
First-Glance Potential: 20%
Recorder to Randoseru
Summary: “The manga revolves around Atsushi Miyagawa and his sister Atsumi Miyagawa. Atsushi looks like an adult at 180 centimeters (about 71 inches) tall, but he is actually an elementary school boy. Atsumi looks like a little girl at 137 centimeters (54 inches) tall, but she is actually in high school. “ – (Taken from ANN)
Director: Hiroshi Kimura
Series Composition: Ryou Karasuma
Other Notable Staff: Takaaki Anzai (Music)
The Positives: Next up in the category of series that can only happen in Japan: two siblings who look nothing like their ages. At first sight this seems like it might just be an interesting series. This will be the debut of director Hiroshi Kimura, and he has worked on episodes of series as Koi Kaze, Haibane Renmei and Gungrave, so he should know what it takes to tell a serious story.
The Negatives: However, this is still produced by Seven, the same people who gave us Morita-San wa Mukuchi, the incredibly poorly produced show where it felt like nobody really cared what they were making. The series composition guy will be the same. I really have no idea what’s up with these really cheaply produced series lately.
First-Glance Potential: 25%
The New Prince of Tennis
Summary: “This continues what happened in the “Prince of Tennis “, after the end of the tournament . In “The New Prince of Tennis,” Ryoma and the others (team members and teams they faced) begin a new adventure when they are the only 50 middle school students to be invited to the Japanese High School Representatives Selection Camp where only the top potentials in the Japanese tennis world train.” – (Taken from ANN)
Director: Shunsuke Tada
Other Notable Staff: Cher Watanabe (Music), Takuya Hiromitsu (Sound Direction)
The Positives: This thing will be produced by MSC. They’re a small animation company, founded from Production IG, and while they did produce a bunch of OVAs (which mostly were Prince of Tennis OVAs), this will be their first full fledged Television series. As newbies on the market, I wish them good luck. The director they got for this one also is an interesting one: the director of Bungaku Shoujo and World Destruction. That does show that this guy needs good source material, but he’s got an interesting style.
The Negatives: I’ve heard… some bad things about the Prince of Tennis franchise. I’ve never seen a single episode of it, but from what I’ve heard it’s got one of the most obnoxiously perfect main characters in the book. Beyond that, I also have a very unnerving question here: in total, the Prince of Tennis has gotten 209 episodes and one movie… and they still haven’t left middle school?! What have they been doing for these past 200 episodes? O.o
First-Glance Potential: 50%
Nisemonogatari
Summary: “The story is set in the early 21st century as a sequel to another NisiOisin story, Bakemonogatari, and it centers around the “Fire Sisters” Tsukihi and Karen Araragi. “ – (Taken from ANN)
Director: Akiyuki Shinbo
Series Composition: Fuyashi Tou, Akiyuki Shinbo
Other Notable Staff: Satoru Kousaki (Music), Akio Watanabe (Character Designs), Toshiharu Iijima (Art Direction)
The Positives: Oooh, you really make things hard, don’t you, Shaft? Here is the thing: with this, Shinbo has finally done what I’ve been hoping him to do for ages now: stop being involved in a truckload of different series at the same time and just focus on one series and make that one as good as possible. I really hated how he basically used his own style as an excuse to rush through all of his series, instead of just making one good one. With this, he has actually taken a half-year break and not released anything.
The Negatives: However, will that be enough to finally put an end to some of the most obnoxious Shaft tropes? The big one is how there hasn’t been a single Shaft Sequel that was just as good or better than its original, and I already didn’t like Bakemonogatari. The thing is, that I really want to like this guy, but when he keeps telling these half-assed stories full of pointless symbolism that actually gets in the way of telling this story, then I’m not in.
First-Glance Potential: 50%
Senhime Zesshou Symphogear
Summary: “The anime follows two girls in a top vocal unit named Zweiwing who fight to save humanity against a threat known as “Noise.” “ – (Taken from ANN)
Director: Tatsufumi Ito
Series Composition: Akifumi Kaneko
Other Notable Staff: Elements Garden (Music), Noriyasu Agematsu (Original Creator), Thomas Romain (Art Director, Future Visuals), Fumiaki Kouta (Action Director)
The Positives: Encourage Films did a random ONA in the past, but this is the first time they do a full series on their own. I wish them good luck. This is all in all a very weird production, because the original creator is one of the musical composer from the band Elements Garden. On top of that, Thomas Romain, the director of the japanese inspired Code Lyoko and co-production of Oban Star Races and the original creator of Basquash will handle the art direction. It’s clear that this studio emerged from Satelight, and it’s very interesting to see that someone like Thomas Romain went along with them. Fumiaki Kouta behind the action direction also brings a lot of promise considering his huge experience. Also: it’s a music battle tv anime. What the hell?
The Negatives: And then bizarrely enough this also got the director of Shugo Chara Party (that huge cop-out) and a guy behind the series composition without any other experience (pseudonym?). Ah well, Tatsufumi Ito has shown that he can direct with his work on some episodes of Casshern and Croisee.
First-Glance Potential: 70%
Ano Natsu de Matteru
Summary: “All that’s known at this point is that this is an original story about a romantic comedy between three teenagers.”
Series Composition: Yosuke Kuroda
Other Notable Staff: Taraka Uon (Character Designs)
The Positives: Here is an interesting project: most romantic comedies nowadays are adaptations of either mangas, light novels or hentai games. This time however, we have a series that is completely anime original. And not only that, it’s written by Yosuke Kuroda. Now, I have not seen Onegai Teacher, which seems to be the closest comparison to this series, but we’re talking about the guy who wrote Madlax, Infinite Ryvius, Gundam OO, and who adapted Trigun, High School of the Dead, Phantom, Gungrave, Honey and Clover and Ookiku Furikabutte. If anyone can make a romantic comedy work, then it’s this guy.
The Negatives: Though granted, Yosuke Kuroda isn’t perfect. His list of bad shows is also quite long with Maken-Ki, Ring ni Kakero, Kokoro Library, Spider Riders and Yumeria. If this guy really wants to though, he can make something very interesting here.
First-Glance Potential: 70%
The Knight in the Area
Summary: “Believing himself to be useless at soccer, Aizawa Kakeru is the manager of his school’s Soccer team, while his brother Suguru is its ace, and is even good enough to represent Japan. However, Kakeru may be harbouring a strong talent within himself that only Suguru can see, and the two often get into arguments over Kakeru’s denial of his skills. Things are made more complicated when Suguru dies in a car accident and Kakeru got a heart injury and needs a heart transplant, given by their parents’ heart. Seven, an old playmate of theirs that Kakeru has a crush on. She join Aizawa Kakeru in his journey to the national and even international championships.” – (Taken from ANN)
Director: Hirofumi Ogura
Other Notable Staff: Tadashi Agi (Original Story)
The Positives: Tadashi Agi seems to be a veteran in the manga business. I haven’t seen any of his works, but his experience might be interesting for this series. This is produced by Shin-Ei Animation, and it’s been a while since they released anything (they were behind a truckload of Doraemon movies, but also Kappa to Coo to Natsuyasumi. Hirofumi Ogura meanwhile was the director of Kuroshitsuji II, which proved to be an excellent tongue in the cheek sequel.
The Negatives: You know… something tells me that the original creator is a really, really big fan of a guy named Adachi. My big problem with this show at the moment lies with the premise of this show, which feels like someone took an Adachi storyline, and turned it into a soap opera, removing all the subtlety from it. The reason Adachi’s works work is because of how well they’re told, not because how he tries to be as sad as possible.
First-Glance Potential: 70%
Poyopoyo Kansatsu Nikki
Summary: “The slice-of-life manga centers around a mysterious “spherical cat” named Poyo, its family, and the people in Poyo’s everyday life.” – (Taken from ANN)
Director: Akitaro Daichi
The Positives: Do not get fooled here: this show is being directed by the guy who is pretty much the best and most consistent comedy director out there. Akitarou Daichi has a track record of working on a ton of different series, and being consistently hilarious no matter what he’s working on.
The Negatives: At the same time though, I’d really wish that this guy would get back and work on a project with a bit more ambition. I mean, this is also the guy who brought us Now and Then, Here and There and the adaptation of Fruits Basket.
First-Glance Potential: 70%
Brave10
Summary: “The story reimagines the legendary adventures of the 10 brave warriors assembled by the warlord Sanada Yukimura in the year 1600, in the middle of Japan’s tumultuous Sengoku (Warring States) era. “ – (Taken from ANN)
Director: Kiyoko Sayama
Series Composition: Mamiko Ikeda
Other Notable Staff: Yukiko Ban (Animation Director)
The Positives: This will be produced by Studio Sakimakura, who are completely new on the market. Nice! Also nice is that another series at least tries to take the Sengoku Era seriously, without turning its characters into girls or something. Yukiko Ban meanwhile is a very solid choice behind the animation director, having previously done so with Amatsuki, .Hack//Sign and Shinrei Tantei Yakumo. It’s also great to see Kiyoko Sayawa back again, as she’s one of the few female directors out there, and her work on Pretear and Skip Beat definitely caught my eye. This show can become what Hakuouki failed to do.
The Negatives: I’m a bit iffy on Mamiko Ikeda. She’s not entirely bad, she did a great job on adapting Victorian Romance Emma, Tsukikage Ran and Fruits Basket… only not so much on Regios, Maid Sama, Nagasarete Airantou and Hanasakeru Seishounen…
First-Glance Potential: 75%
Danshi Koukousei no Nichijou
Summary: “As the title indicates, the gag comedy manga follows the humorous yet “realistic” everyday life of Tadakuni, Hidenori, Yoshitake, and other students at a boys’ high school.” – (Taken from ANN)
Director: Shinji Takamatsu
Other Notable Staff: Audio Highs (Music), Kenichi Tajiri (Art Direction), Souta Ooya, Ai Yoshimura
The Positives: Here we do have an interesting project: the first 100 episodes of Gintama (basically the best part of the show) were directed by Shinji Takamatsu. Even though his previous attempt at a series failed with Sora no Manimani, I’m still curious to see what he can do with a bit of a wilder premise that isn’t just any other romantic comedy. He brought some solid directors along with him it seems, and also the art direction seems to have potential here.
The Negatives: My main complaint here is that the whole premise isn’t that interesting, but slice of life comedies really depend on their execution anyway.
First-Glance Potential: 75%
Aquarion Evol
Summary: “Twelve thousand years in the past, mankind was at mercy of the mythical creatures known as Shadow Angels, immortal winged beings with overwhelming powers and technology. That is, until one of their kind, Apolonius, fell in love with a female human warrior, Seliane. Apolonius joins forces with the humans to free them from their oppression, by using the legendary giant fighting robot Aquarion” – (Taken from Wikipedia)
Chief Director: Shoji Kawamori
Director: Yuusuke Yamamoto
Series Composition: Mari Okada
Other Notable Staff: Yoko Kanno (Theme Song)
The Positives: Oh boy. Shoji Kawamori and Mari Okada working together on one series. I have no idea how well that’s going to go, but it definitely has me interested. I never bothered to watch Aquarion because its premise just didn’t seem interesting enough to marathon compared to all the other shows that I still need to check out (yeah, it was a very subjective reason), however when it airs weekly like this I think that I’ll have enough motivation to keep watching it. Especially now that Mari Okada is involved. Oh, and not to mention the director of NHK ni Youkoso and B Gata H Kei. These are some of the strongest names that Shoji Kawamori worked together with in a long time.
The Negatives: If Kawamori TROLLS ME ONE MORE TIME….
First-Glance Potential: 80%
Black Rock Shooter
Summary: “Mato Kuroi just got into junior high school, and on the first day, someone catches her eye; her classmate Yomi Takanashi. The two meet.The innocent and naive Mato. The mature Yomi. Seemingly opposites, but the time they spend together only strengthens a growing friendship. But as they go into their second year at the school, they get placed in separate classes, and they begin to grow apart. But somewhere simultaneously… In another world, a young girl, blue fire residing in her eyes, Black Rock Shooter faces another young girl; this one holding a jet-black scythe, Dead Master, and a battle to the death begins to unfold.” – (Taken from ANN)
Director: Shinobu Yoshioka
Series Composition: Mari Okada
Other Notable Staff: Yusuke Yoshigaki (Animation Director), First-Glance Potential: 80%
Tantei Opera Milky Holmes 2
Summary: “In the future world, people use ‘Toys’ that grant them superhuman abilities like ESP and telekinesis. This has led to a boom in both minor crimes and the need for Toy-using detectives to track down the offenders and bring them to justice. Opera Koyabashi runs the detective agency, Milky Holmes, staffed by four cheerful and energetic girls.” – (Taken from ANN)
The Positives: The exact staff of this series hasn’t been announced yet, but it’s very likely that the same guys will be returning for this sequel of the series that really surprised me when it first came out. At first it seemed like this really dull moe show, but it actually turned out to be a very funny detective parody with very likable characters and surprisingly good animation at times (courtesy of Seiya Numata).
The Negatives: The big question will be: will this be as good as the first season? The problem with comedy sequels is that they’re hardly ever as good as their predecessors. The second season is the point where the inspiration runs dry, the best jokes have been already told, the writers try too hard, all resulting in a lesser experience. Especially in the case of the good comedies like this one. Let’s hope that this can avoid this syndrome.
First-Glance Potential: 80%
Inu x Boku SS
Summary: “The Shirakiin house’s daughter, Shirakiin Ririchiyo, who has a complex about being unable to live independently and unprotected, feels the need to move out and live on her own under the condition of residing in the mansion named “Ayakashi Kan.” In this mansion, only those who have cleared a very strict examination could reside in it, and for each resident, they are accompanied with one agent of the Secret Service (S.S.). Although Riricho has rejected the company of the S.S., while residing in the mansion she finds out that the agent dedicated to protecting her is actually the Fox Spirit whom she previously rescued.” – (Taken from ANN)
Director: Naokatsu Tsuda
Series Composition: Saizo Nemoto
Other Notable Staff: Haruko Iizuka (Animation Direction), Takyua Satou (Supervision)
The Positives: There are very few studios nowadays that can immediately gain my interest upon a normally dull looking show as David Production. With Ben-To they showed that even with the moe shows, they try their best to make it entertaining. And indeed, the premise here does seem more interesting than your average moe show. On top of that we’ve got a talented animation director working here and it’s supervised by the director of Niea and Steins;Gate. The director will be a new guy, which is also interesting. He worked on a bunch of interesting episodes already. Saizo Nemoto also sounds quite interesting, as he adapted quite a few episodes for Bantorra, Steins;Gate, Shangri La and Toward the Terra.
The Negatives: Saizo Nemoto is also currently writing Towa no Quon, which disappointed a little. That’s all I have.
First-Glance Potential: 85%
Mouretsu Pirates
Summary: “Marika is a first year high school student living in a far away galaxy known as Uminoakeboshi. One day she finds out that her recently deceased father was once the captain of the space pirate ship called the Bentenmaru. More importantly, the only one to inherit the captain’s title has to be a direct descendant – meaning that Marika is next in line to become the captain of the ship.” – (Taken from ANN)
Director: Tatsuo Sato
Series Composition: Tatsuo Sato
Other Notable Staff: Hiroshi Takeuchi (Chief Animation Director), Kenji Teraoka (Mechanical Design), Masahisa Suzuki (Mechanical Design), Shoji Kawamori (Mechanical Design)
The Positives: Hell yeah! This sounds like a fun and exciting story from Satelight. They got some really good animators and designers behind it (including the animation director of The Big O of all things), and Tatsuo Sato will really be the man of this season, with two very ambitious mecha series under his helm. I’m expecting a lot here from the director of Nadesico, Stellvia, Tokyo Tribe, Shingu and Shigofumi, especially since he’s also writing the series composition on top of directing. It’s been a while since someone had the guts to do that.
The Negatives: Moe and boobs. Please don’t let those get in the way of making this one fun.
First-Glance Potential: 85%
Rinne no Lagrange: Flower declaration of your heart
Summary: “Kyono Madoka is a 17-year-old girl, who loves her home town Kamogawa and likes to help people in trouble. She rides a robot called Woks in her jersey wear and fights against aliens.” – (Taken from MAL)
Chief Director: Tatsuo Sato
Director: Toshimasa Suzuki
Series Composition: Shoutarou Suga
Other Notable Staff: Eiji Umehara (Script), Hiroshi Oonogi (Script), Shigeru Morita (Script), Touko Machida (Script), Yuuichi Nomura (Script), Chizuru Kobayashi (Character Designs), Michie Watanabe (Art Director)
The Positives: Could it be? Is Xebec finally getting a bit ambitious again? It’s been ages since we’ve seen a good mecha, so I really hope that this one will be it. The chief director behind it in any case will be amazing, and I’m expecting a lot from the same guy who brought us Shingu, Cat Soup, Nadesico, Tokyo Tribe and Shigofumi. The cast of this series seems huge, which seems to be working in his favor. The director of Heroic Age and the Fafner Movie also can make things quite interesting here and the team is complete with nobody other than the guy who wrote Darker than Black and various episodes of all kinds of awesome series as Chevalier, Blood+, Ghost in the Shell, Seirei no Moribito and Wild Arms. Oh, and to make matters even better: Hiroshi Ohnogi (you know, the guy behind the series composition of Birdy the Mighty, Full Metal Alchemist Brotherhood, NOEIN, and Shangri-la, among many others will be among the scriptwriters. This has some HUGE potential.
The Negatives: The obvious flaw of this is the fanservicy character designs, but also the collection of scriptwriters: it’s got some of the best, but also some of the worst ones. Most notably Machida Touko, who has ruined many great premises by her mediocre scriptwriting.
First-Glance Potential: 90%
Another
Summary: “Horror novel reader Kouichi Sakakibara moves to his grandparents home after his father went abroad, but soon after turning 15 he’s hospitalized by a sudden pneumothorax, missing his first day of school. In the hospital he meets a mysterious girl called Mei Misaki. After recovery he joins the 3rd year 3-Class at North Yomiyama Middle School. Kouichi finds Mei Misaki is in the same class, but notice that the rest of his classmates don’t see her and avoid to speak about it. He later hear from his aunt from the story of a prestigious girl in the same class from 26 years before that died in an accident. Refusing to accept it her classmates kept pretending she was still alive. In that year’ graduation commemorative photograph, the girl supposedly not to be was there. Her name was Mei Misaki.” – (Taken from ANN)
Director: Tsutomu Mizushima
Series Composition: Ryou Higaki
Other Notable Staff: Kou Otani (Music), Satoru Hirayanagi (Art Director), Yoshimasa Yamazaki (3D Director), Yoshikazu Iwanami
The Positives: This one will be a show to keep your eye out to. PA Works assembled some great staff for it, including their usual background art artists (just look at Hana-Saku Iroha for the amazing things these people can do), Kou Otani is making the soundtrack, the series composition will e done by one of the scriptwriters of Seirei no Moribito, and to finish things off: Tsutomu Mizushima (who also directed Ookiku Furikabutte, Blood-C, xxxHolic and Squid Girl) will be directing it. The series is in an excellent genre as well, so I’m looking forward to this.
The Negatives: A high school. The creators had better make good use of this cliche.
First-Glance Potential: 90%
Natsume Yuujinchou Shi
Summary: “Natsume Takashi has the ability to see spirits, which he has long kept secret. However, once he inherits a strange book that belonged to his deceased grandmother, Reiko, he discovers the reason why spirits surround him. Containing the names of these spirits, a binding contract was formed between the spirits and the owner of the book. Now, Natsume is determined to free the spirits and dissolve the contracts. With the help of a spirit cat, his days are filled trying to return the names to these spirits.” – (Taken from ANN)
Director: Takehiro Omori
Series Composition: Sadayuki Murai
Other Notable Staff: Makoto Yoshimori (Music)
The Positives: Well, what can there be said about this series at this point? The third season that aired this summer was just exquisite and brought in a ton of character development for the titular character. And then to think that it was nowhere near finished. The staff for this series will be the same, so the incredibly strong direction and script of Takehiro Omori (who previously directed Baccano, Jigoku Shoujo, Fancy Lala and Koi Kaze) and Sadayuki Murai (who previously adapted Boogiepop Phantom and Mouryou no Hako, two utterly brilliant adaptations) should be able to work their magic again.
The Negatives: So far, Natsume’s stories that just took part into one single episode have been the strongest. I really hope that the creators put in many of these kinds of episodes. The main storyline of Natsume Yuujinchou is very good, but not THAT good.
First-Glance Potential: 95%
]]>
Mawaru Penguin Drum – 19
@#$*!@#&!@!^&!!! I should have known! I should have bloody known! I’m not going to say why I should have known, but this episode just delivered a truckload of major plot twists.
The first big one was revealed, right at the start of the episode: Kanba has been in contact with his parents all along. They’re the ones who gave him the money to cure Himari’s illness. I also love the way this was revealed, taking a place in the episode where you really wouldn’t expect it, with\out any obvious build-up whatsoever.
The second big plot twist: they’re not real siblings. Holy crap. I mean, this is a twist that has been pulled many times before, but this show just got it right by not making this as shallow as the others, which nearly always boil down to “we’re doing this for the incest”. Save for perhaps the first episode, the three siblings in Penguin Drum really felt like siblings, who were especially close to each other due to what happened with their parents.
And just when I thought that this would turn into this strange love triangle around Kanba… it is revealed that the one who originally introduced Himari to the family was Shouma.
Rating: *** (Awesome)]]>
Hyouge Mono – 31
The seemingly impossible has happened: someone actually eclipsed Sasuke in terms of eccentricity. This entire episode was dedicated to Date Masamune. And dear god. When you thought that his version of Sengoku Basara was exaggerated, you haven’t seen anything yet.
This guy was hilarious, but in particular when in the vicinity of Sasuke himself. It’s amazing how well these crazed idiots managed to play off each other. As for Sasuke, I guess that last week, his voice actor had some sort of cold or something, because here his voice was back to normal. It remains very strange to suddenly have a different voice for just one episode. That was the first time in which I actually noticed something like that.
Rikyuu meanwhile… oh my god. Just when I thought he was done with his character development, the creators put an extra notch to it.
Rating: *** (Awesome)]]>
Persona 4 The Animation – 07
Um… seriously? Was last week really all just building up… to this? Did I really want to see that?
Ah well. Seiji Kishi remains a comedy director, so at least he’d know how to deal with a chapter like this week. This episode was more interesting than the previous ones, because finally it did something unexpected and went away from its formula. This episode was fun in a weird way, and at least I like that the cast of main characters will be increasing with every persona that gets defeated, rather than just never mentioning them again like I first though.
But even then, this episode was strangely underwhelming in its execution. I mean, I know Seiji Kishi. I have seen many of his other works, and his comedy has this very distinctive style that relies on strong comedic timing and hard punchlines. This episode instead was a mess in terms of timing. The events didn’t flow into each other at all, and this episode would have been greatly improved if Seiji Kishi used his experience in actually timing this thing properly. It’s not even about the jerky animation: he directed Tentai Senshi Sunred for god’s sake.
It’s again the fault of this show trying to be too faithful to the original game. That’s not going to work. I know that everyone keeps going on about being faithful and all, but game adaptations NEED to have some freedom if they want to succeed on their own. They’re not like manga where you can just copy and paste a bunch of panels and get things over with.
The one praise that I do have for this series: whoever is in charge of the photographic direction really knows what he’s doing here. This show has some very good looking shots and camera angles and while it’s a pity that this constrains the actual animation a bit too much, it nevertheless looks very good.
Rating: (Enjoyable)]]>
Un-Go – 06
This show is clever. Every single episode contains a single story, but the first episodes of all the multi-episode arcs all contain these slight hints that things aren’t over with. This episode was the same: it already was a great standalone story, and yet there still are a few things that don’t add up.
Of course there was the obvious end of the episode, in which what feels like the main antagonist made his formal introduction, but also: why was the critic of this episode in jail? Why did Kaishou not reveal that he had this guy’s children taken away from their mother? Why did this guy refuse to ask Kaishou about what was up with the books? There is still a whole storyline here that has yet been explored, even though the end of this episode made it seem like the end of the story was reached.
In any case, this episode once again was just wonderfully written. Once again, this show just comes with twist after twist after twist, and things that seem completely random at first make complete sense once everything is revealed. Beyond that, in order to make up for the way in which this series doesn’t have time to carefully flesh out its characters, it does make the cast fun. This episode inserted these small jokes at the points where they didn’t get in the way of the real storytelling, and especially the android has helped here. This leads to quite an interesting chemistry between the characters.
Heck, I’ll be surprised if this show doesn’t end up as the best Bones show of the year.
Rating: *** (Awesome)]]>
Infinite Ryvius Review – 92,5/100
There was pretty much only one reason why I was really looking forward to checking out Infinite Ryvius: because I had seen it being praised for having very realistic and true to life characters. Now that I finished watching it, I can wholeheartedly agree with that, but just that statement alone also does a complete injustice of just how good this show really is.
The cast in this show is true to life, but by god, that’s not everything. This show has pretty much one of the best uses of teenagers in a space opera I’ve seen. Perhaps only Bokura no surpasses it here, if you really stretch the definition of “space opera”. This show is about the crew of a space ship. The entire cast of Infinite Ryvius consists out of teenagers, but for once, it makes perfect sense in the context of the story, they actually make full use of the young age of everyone to create a storyline that would never have been possible with adults. The fact that everyone is just a kid is vital to just about everything in the story.
What’s also amazing is how perfectly paced this show is. I mean, above I said that the characters are really true to life. They are very easy to relate to, and their actions throughout the series are very realistic. And yet at the same time the creators somehow turned this into a roller-coaster of a series that hardly ever takes a break. I’m completely amazed at how well the creators manage to weave everything together into one series. The cast of this show is huge, every episode brings a ton of new developments for the characters, and yet it doesn’t feel rushed. The story is the complete definition of utter chaos, and yet it’s full of twists, and yet the creators succeeded in making it move naturally. Despite having a ton of characters who all change significantly multiple times, all at their own pace, it makes sure to make all of them relatable, very strongly acted and miles away from stereotypes.
The only thing I’d have to mention against this series’ favor is that there is techno-babble, but it’s not even badly used. This show has its own original setting, and with that comes a bit of terminology that will take a bit of time to remember all of the different aspects of it.
Seriously, this may not have strings of over the top action scenes, but this show was made in 1999. I haven’t seen any Sunrise series made after that that was able to top this series. Not even Bakumatsu Kikansetsu Irohanihoheto. It’s an emotional roller-coaster that somehow managed to avoid stereotypes, one-dimensional characters, hamming it up or other kinds of insincere melodrama, and it manages to blend all sorts of emotions wonderfully together. Definitely a recommendation for science fiction fans.
| Storytelling: | 10/10 – Rock-solid themes, fantastically balanced pacing, is guided by chaos, and yet manages to lead that chaos into a wonderful storyline. |
| Characters: | 10/10 – An utterly brilliant cast of characters who play wonderfully off each other. |
| Production-Values: | 8/10 – No flashy graphics, but very good inbetween work. |
| Setting: | 9/10 – There are some very neat ideas. Not just on the backstory itself, but also how it’s used in context with the story. |
Chihayafuru – 07
Character number four: he too has his purpose. There were two big roles for him in this episode. First of all, to develop Taichi. The previous side character was meant to fuel Chihaya’s interest in Karuta even more than it already was. This guy is meant for Taichi, to show that there are other people in his league, other than Arata.
Purpose number two: show variations of Karuta. For me, this is another very interesting way to keep the karuta matches interesting. Chihaya has been completely involved in competitive Karuta, so that she has no eyes for the details around it. Karuta is the type of game which lends itself perfectly for variations, like what happened in this episode with the flipped down cards, which give you a totally different perspective on how you play the game.
Karuta still is a bit of a strange game to me. Especially the way in which players are given the opportunity to memorize the places of each card for 15 minutes. This to me seems to take away part of the fun of actually trying to look for the card that gets called amidst the forest of other cards. Right now, it’s a game with a very high emphasis on memorization and reaction speed, with hardly anything more.
If the creators can keep this focus on such a simple game consistently interesting throughout the entire series like what it’s currently doing, then they can even successfully make a series about rock paper scissors.
Rating: ** (Excellent)]]>