Summer 2011 Kaleidoscope – Week 29

by psgels, posted in Summer 2011 Kaleidoscope




Okay. I know what I’m going to do this season: another Kaleidoscope, though in a different format from the previous times I’ve done one. There’s just too much interesting stuff this season, it’s unbelievable. Instead, I’m going to be writing short blurbs and impressions about all (or most) of the episodes that interest me. It’s an experiment. I have no idea whether it’s going to work, but this seems like the perfect season to try it out, with so many great series.

Dantalian no Shoka – 02
Ah, you can see that this show too is in need of more time: this episode felt a bit rushed, and yet it did retain its atmosphere. Overall this seems to be much more about atmosphere than its mysteries compared to its sister-series of Gosick and Kami-Sama no Memo-Chou, and I guess that that’s where this fast pacing works. Now, this episode was flawed (“You may have thought that you stabbed me, but I was saved by this book that I conveniently carried in my pocket at exactly the right place!” – that is one twist you should not pull!), plus the transformation sequence was significantly less interesting when we saw it for the second time (especially in contrast with Penguin Drum), but I really like the experimental animation, the banter is quite nice, the male lead is no pansy and isn’t the idiot that Kujou was. Oh, and another plus is that Dalian so far has been the only teenager in the series. That helps too.
Rating: * (Good)

Gyakkyou Burai Kaiji – 42
It’s really hard to imagine what the rest of this arc is going to look like. I mean, normal conventions would say that the next episode would focus on breaking the second barrier, the episode after that on the third layer, leaving a final climax to wrap everything up. This thing however still has a whopping eight episodes left. At the very least. Seriously, this already is an intense thriller and I really like the mind games so far: is it just going to drag on over and over, or is there really such an awesome climax waiting?
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Sacred Seven – 03
The main problem with this show so far is not that it’s generic. That’s just something that doesn’t really help. Instead, this show is too one-sided and does a poor job at fleshing out its characters: there are way too many dark and brooding emo characters with very little other traits to their character. Seriously, the main couple is emo, the newly introduced villain is emo, the main side-kick is emo, half of the side characters are emo. That’s not the most interesting combination to work with! The one exception was the action scene of episode two. More of that, please!
Rating: (Enjoyable)

Usagi Drop – 03
Usually when a series addresses workaholics, it’s done quite one-sidedly: parents who fell in love with their jobs and forget about spending time with their children. Even with that, you can get some good drama out of it (the most recent example of this is Showa Monogatari). Usagi Drop however rocks because of how well it takes a look at this topic, how the main character is trying to balance his life as a typical salaryman while suddenly having to raise a child. This third episode made things even better by showing other cases of this with Daikichi’s mother and a coworker of his. I don’t have a child myself, but a lot of my coworkers are in that stage of their life, so this series hits surprisingly close to home for me right now.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Blade – 04
I’m still not sure whether Blade is going to work or not. On one hand, the writing can get incredibly cheesy at times (though thankfully still nowhere near Iron Man levels), and the facial animations also leaves a lot to be desired. And yet this series abandons Japan and goes to the Philippines instead, and out of all of the Marvel-series so far, it has by far devoted the most time to the past of the main character and is by far the most character-oriented of the four series. A main theme of this series is also for Blade to be saved from his really, really dark childhood, which also provides a good reason for the female lead to be there (so likely no more Hisako-esque debacles). Nevertheless though: Madhouse. Please try to spend more time in how to correctly animate facial expressions. It’s really getting silly now.
Rating: * (Good)

Kamisama Dolls – 03
A killer is on the loose, so what does the village responsible for him send to get him back? A little girl. Okay, so this third episode takes care of that by introducing more different characters, and spicing things up quite nicely. The second half of the episode had great chemistry, acting and the dark atmosphere that also made the first episode really good. As for the first half… at least it was funny. Having a comedy director on this thing really helps to get the delivery right. But what’s this about the Kamisama Dolls manga not being finished? I mean, here we have the perfect set-up for an action-packed 13 episode series. Is the story really large enough to warrant more time than that? On one hand, this is a good series to create an anime original ending for. On the other hand: Makoto Uezu is adapting this series. You do not want to give him freedom, because that just screws everything up into a boring fanservice-fest.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Kami-Sama no Memo-Chou – 03

by psgels, posted in Kami-Sama no Memo-Chou



And this show too breaks the Kujou-syndrome. Finally, this episode gave the male lead some character. He may not be a detective, but this episode instead established him as a con-man, and certainly something other than an idiot who just holds the others back. Instead, his main flaw is that he’s physically weak, which is something that plenty of other characters have covered here. In other words: the main cast are all filling in for each others’ weaknesses, which is a very good thing to spice things up.

On top of that, the fanservice in this episode was a lot more subtle and actually didn’t feel out of place, plus the comic relief also got better and balanced. This may seem like small nitpicking, but when it was the main flaw of the first two episodes, it’s really great to see this improve as well.

Now, I did cringe when the male lead suddenly claimed that banks could easily be hacked and all, but thankfully they realized that such a thing was impossible. That’s also quite rare in series that feature hacking: generally those seem to believe that even potato chips can be hacked. . Now, this episode did not have the most interesting villains who on top of that were dumbed down in order to make them a) believe this b) fail to overtake a high school kid dragging another high school kid around and c) not taking a lot of security measures in case something went wrong. I can forgive this for the sake of variety, though, since the first episode did have interesting villains.

I can understand using Yakuza as a villain and all, since they’re pretty much one of the biggest criminal organizations in the world and all, but the problem is that they’re always portrayed very stereotypically. Kaiji is currently one of the few series who really made them an actual threat. This is not just criticism on this episode, but on anime in general.

This is just nit-picking, though. the dialogue is still among the best of the season, and once again this episode put a ton of new information about its characters in just these 20 minutes. For variety’s sake this episode also had much less Alice than usual, which also is good to spice things up and prevent one character from standing out too much. I’m surprised at how large the cast already is in this series, but I have to say that this is a great attempt at a series with a huge cast so far. The key is to give everyone enough time to show off, while at the same time not trying to make everyone equal a la Idolm@ster.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Blood-C – 03

by psgels, posted in Blood-C



I don’t know who are exactly the ones who put together the fight scenes of this series, but I once again have to praise them, because in that aspect this series is the best of the season. Even though the runner-up Dantalian no Shoka has a bigger budget and also plenty of interesting visual ideas for itself, this one goes a step further in the way in which it animates Saya’s struggle with the monsters she fights. It’s not the writing that rocks here, it really is the animation that really brings those to life.

As for the rest of the series… I still like it a lot. It’s indeed unfortunate that it uses many cliches, but for me at the moment, the good points overshadow the bad points enough to make me not bothered by it. I mean, this show has obviously been building up for its first three episodes, and with that I don’t mean a complex story, but I’m more pointing towards its atmosphere. Whether everything has been balanced out properly is unfortunately something we can only say a year and a half from now, when the movie has properly aired. With that, I can understand the inclusion of the fights that Saya has: they have two functions: to build up the atmosphere themselves, and offer a sharp contrast with the slice of life scenes to prevent this series from really getting dull, seeing as how mundane the quiet scenes in this series are.

At this point, I don’t feel yet that Blood+ is wasting its time. But then again, we can only tell that for sure when everything has aired. In my experience the really unbalanced series only tend to show this from their middle part, not their first three episodes.

As for the criticisms on the characterization, I can understand some of them. Saya is a bit dull, and it’s during the quiet scenes that the animation also dulls in. I still think that these past episodes have been great ways to get to know the cast, though, as ordinary high school students. This episode explored how they spend their time after school and other mundane stuff. What makes it different from the series with dull characterizations is that 1) the acting is good and solid (most of the overacting you’ll hear here is those twins, and Saya actually doesn’t have the vocals of a J-pop idol), along with the dialogue that talks about inspired topics, courtesy of Clamp.

Now, the end of this episode was excellent foreshadowing, and it seems like the plot is also going to get interesting next episode.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Hyouge Mono – 16

by psgels, posted in Hyouge Mono



This was a fairly focused episode: most of it revolved around Furuta Sasuke visiting Tokugawa Ieyasu. This, after the pineapple incident when Oda Nobunaga was still alive. Once again it takes a unique approach to what would have been a political meeting by focusing more on the food that gets served and silly dances.

That silly dance was by far the biggest wtf-part of the episode. Silly dances are of course one thing, but in a series where the character designs are so much more detailed than usual, This episode was really a bit of a political game, and I also liked how Sasuke had huge troubles not following Tokugawa Ieyasu’s example with the pineapple and get into a fit of rage.

And again, this show handles deaths very well. This time, by not spending a lot of time to it, and just focus on the funeral of Sasuke’s brother. And again, to think that Sasuke already has two children. That’s another reason why the past season rocked: normally you never see an old protagonist, and yet here suddenly come two series with main characters who already have significantly old kids. Now the summer season brings in Usagi Drop, and I really wish that this is going to be the start of another trend.

But then again, I really doubt that Hyouge Mono will become a trendsetter. I mean, it’s got the ideas and all, but I doubt that it’s going to have the influence…
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Mawaru Penguin Drum – 03

by psgels, posted in Mawaru Penguin Drum



Okay, Penguin Drum has definitely made the best first impression of the entire season. There are just so many details stuffed into it that do an amazing job at fleshing the story out. The creators really nailed the dialogue of the stalker girl. Combined with the background music they did really well in portraying a young girl in love. The stalker part is there, but subtle enough to not take over her entire character. You don’t see that often with crazy characters.

This series also does a ton of things that play around with known tropes. I mean, at first sight it’ll look like this series will be moving around from side-character to side-character, and yet the OP and ED are full of apple symbolism. Much more than what you would expect if the character was just going to disappear once her arc is over.

I also really want to praise the creative symbolism here. The apples are of course the obvious ones (not just in terms of all the images, but also in Ringo’s apple curry for example), but that cat with that fish, or that cow suit also were great, or take the ads in the train that just keep changing with every episode. And the creators just continue to stuff details into that. I really feel like no moment of this show is wasted.

On top of that though, this series has also plenty of deep points. It’s like Kanba said: how far are they willing to go in order to protect Himari? There are 21 episodes left. I really suspect that this line will come to bite him back in time. At this point the Penguin Drum is still pretty much of a McGuffin, but will it remain like that?
Rating: ** (Excellent)

No.6 – 03

by psgels, posted in No.6



So, the obvious question when you start watching No.6 is: who are these people? Even in the second episode, there is this strange brown-haired guy who looks nothing like the guy on the promo material, although it also provided a big hint about what would suddenly cause this change in hair pigmentation. This episode indeed shows what caused it, and I really have to praise the creators for delivering one heck of an intense scene.

The second half of the episode pushed the story forward again, and put a huge emphasis on morals: letting the killer bees hatch will probably lead to the downfall of No.6 if they’re allowed to spread without being noticed during Winter. This will mean the end of a dystopian society, yet also it will lead to the deaths of countless of innocent people who are merely living their lives without knowing anything about the world. the big question right now is what has Nezumi so convinced that those sacrifices should be made?

I like how this series has a very strong concept of foreshadowing: it doesn’t necessarily have huge cliff-hangers, but instead it ends every episode with the promise of new major revelations. The first episode promised a ton of change and intrigue, the second episode promised the change in hair colour, and now this episode is promising that next week, we’ll learn about the truth of No6. After all, there’s no way that Nezumi is going to wait with that.

Also, regarding the soundtrack: it was the soundtrack that I was looking forward to the most after Dororon Enma-Kun (both show share the same composer), and it has definitely delivered. I especially like the kinds of bombastic soundtracks, and this one is both that and subtle and varied.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Steins;Gate – 16

by psgels, posted in Steins;Gate



This is one of those spoilery episodes. Spoilers I will be talking about below, so if you haven’t seen this episode yet it’s probably wise to just close this window and watch the episode. This line is to make sure that those spoilers don’t show up in blog aggregators.

I’m of course not talking about the identity of Suzuha’s father: Daru. I think it really was clear with the name of the time machine: if Okabe was really Suzuha’s father, then it’d have a really fancy and screwed up name, and yet her father just had to be an important character. I still think that Daru’s voice actor was a bit of a mis-cast. There was this one line where he tried to act cool, but instead sounded more like he does usually. Overall he just sounds strange, in a way that he’s forcing a different voice from his usual range a bit too much.

In any case though, what really struck me about this episode was Suzuha’s death, and how she failed to change the future for more than one percent. Throughout the entire scope of Steins;Gate, the concept of travelling to the future has never been hinted as plausible, and this episode really confirmed that it’s a one-way ticket. On top of that she also gave really strong background to the landlord.

I’m also fascinated at the complication that this has for the future. Especially since this episode was purposefully really vague on what else has changed: what happened to Makise Kurisu? What happened to the IBM5100? I mean: what was the reason why Mayuri’s death was evaded? I see three possibilities:
1. John Titor II never existed and he never gave Okabe the inspiration to experiment with time travel.
2. The message that Okabe received from himself scared him really badly and made him decide to abandon the time machine research.
3. Makise Kurisu never got involved and therefore the time machine is currently different.

I really suspect that a lot here is connected to each other. Suzuha travelled back in time, pretending to be John Titor probably was the cause that Makise Kurisu became a lab member. Interestingly, what would have happened if Okabe never went back in time to where Makise Kurisu was alive, back in that first episode? That also would have been a big setback for CERN. It’s also interesting how the time machine really seems like something that Daru would have built: one that focuses on sending stuff back to the past. It was Makise Kurisu’s influence who suggested sending thoughts back in the past, which so far turned out to be by far the most convenient time machine. I also suspect that that’s the reason why CERN was so easily able to take over the world.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Natsume Yuujin-Chou – 29

by psgels, posted in Natsume Yuujin-Chou



This really was a wonderful episode. The best of the third season so far. It’s focused on Natsume’s past, interestingly, and on the kids who used to bully him. They changed too over the years, and this episode focuses on one who came in contact with a youkai.

Again things are much different from what they seem at first. The guy seems the same jerk at first, but gets much more rounded as the episode goes on, the youkai goes from a cute girl to a monster to a weak cute girl again. It’s great character development, not to mention how confronting this was for Natsume: throughout the entire series he has been trying to leave his past behind him, and here it comes back to him. For the first time we actually got to see Natsume really uncomfortable. The creators handled it really nicely.

Three episodes in, and I have to say that the creators really nailed the consistency so far. Right now, the third season is somewhere in between the first and the second season in terms of how much I like it. What it needs now, is the kinds of episodes that make it stand out: the really well written and heart-warming ones, like the Hotaru-episode. There still is plenty of time to do that, so I really hope that the creators are going to make use of that. In any case this season has the big advantage of character-development.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Ikoku Meiro no Croisée – 03

by psgels, posted in Ikoku Meiro no Croisée



Ah, this was really good. This episode was once again chock full of the main characters exchanging some of the things they grew up with, and the contrasts between them. Yune and Claude grew up in completely different environments, and between that it’s Claude’s grandfather who connects the two. Seriously, this is a premise you don’t see every day here.

They talked about all sorts of different stuff, like naming conventions, language, paper, housing. Oh, and I now know that rain in Japan lasts really long, compared to just the short outbursts of rain that we have in Europe. I also really like how Claude’s father talked in this “you should have been there”-way to Claude, as if he was urging him on to also travel once in a while. It was all really hard to imagine for Claude, especially in such an age where different cultures were relatively far apart from each other.

Apart from that though, you also really feel these characters live their daily lives. Claude spends quite a bit of time working, Oscar meanwhile is enjoying his retirement to the fullest, while Yune also is quite cute when she runs around the house. The dialogue also feels really natural between them. this really is great. There’s just one big but here…

That rich girl… was by far the worst thing to appear in this series so far. I mean, she wasn’t exactly a carbon-copy of the “ojou-sama” you see everywhere, but she was really stereotypical nonetheless. I mean, Yune is great: she’s cute, but she’s not like the stereotypical moe girl who does nothing but whine and go after the main characters’ pants. Beyond being adorable, she’s polite, sharp and curious. She’s not annoying in the slightest. That rich girl really needs to shut up soon, though. Who found it a good idea to make her like that?
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Hana-Saku Iroha – 16

by psgels, posted in Hana-Saku Iroha



Before the actors arrived, I just couldn’t help but think that the entire movie thing was a scan. Then the actors arrived, and I’m not really sure what to think right now.

I mean, while I can buy a film crew making a movie in the inn (it does have a very authentic character, after all), I’m really not sure in what kind of mind the director was to promise important roles to the Kissuiso staff. Even weirder having the novelist assist with the writing… without an editor or even one meeting with the director about what he should write. Then there was that pool thing: why bet on something of which you have no idea how much mold it has accumulated over the past 20 years? (Also, please tell me that that isn’t going to be an excuse to have a pool episode in the near future…). It all seemed way too convenient, and more like this suspicious guy coming onto Ohana’s uncle with this shady deal that required 10% of the Inn’s income.

But no, the actors came, and it actually really looks like the director is just quirky. We’re going to have to wait for the next episode to really see the points it was trying to make, but the focus on Ohana’s uncle was really good. On top of that, this went further on the troubles of a small inn. Actually, I wouldn’t be surprised if the inn ended up going out of business for the climax of this series.

I do have a bit of criticism at this point though, especially when comparing this series to Ao no Exorcist. I know that it’s a bit weird to compare slice of life to shounen fighting and all, but I’m especially referring to the light-hearted scenes (again, this show knows how to do drama correctly): with Ao no Exorcist, I really noticed the light-hearted scenes get more interesting and enjoyable with every episode, as you can see the cast grow. With Hana-Saku Iroha though… this still is more of the same. Those kinds of scenes weren’t really interesting in the first half, and little has changed in the second half I’m afraid.

It’s not really the fact that nothing happens: I have really enjoyed far slower series in the past. But like that scene where Ohana was trying to fly on a broom, or when they were cleaning the pool… it just… didn’t feel right. Too forced, even.

What’s also jarring is that now that I think about it: the second half so far didn’t really have much character development for the main cast. The past arc developed Yuina and her fiance quite well, in Kissuiso (whenever things aren’t happening), things are changing too slowly. Perhaps the biggest change in the main cast is that Minko is less annoyed with Ohana. Compare that to Tiger & Bunny, taking a look to give a ton of new insight to vital characters, Ao no Exorcist who introduced a bunch of new characters to spice things up, Steins;Gate with its plot twists or Hyouge Mono, where [SPOILER]. There seems to be too little movement in this series, and the fact that this is slice of life shouldn’t have anything to do with that: it has enough drama to have made something interesting out of it.
Rating: * (Good)