Hana-Saku Iroha – 11

by psgels, posted in Hana-Saku Iroha



And with this, Hana-Saku Iroha stepped out of the shadow of its first two episodes. This episode once again was great, and full of emotions.

It was a bit random, but nevertheless a great way for Ohana to get back to her mother. Ending up writing a scathing review of the inn where both her daughter and mother work. The tension between her and Ohana in this episode was just amazing, and after that this series managed to make things even better by also involving Ko in the equation.

It was indeed a bit early for me to call her part of the love triangle, but at least I was right about her having a crush on Ko: the signs about her introduction were all there. What I didn’t expect however was for Ko to turn her down. That scene between him and Ohana at the Wac Donalds was some excellent romance: it played with the distance between the two and Ohana’s shyness, without making it a simple “will they won’t they?” This episode also rocked because the creators stuffed in a ton of those small details, like Ohana crumbling that piece of straw wrapper.

Overall, I know that I’ve been a bit harsh on this series while it still was building up. In the past I would have had the patience to indeed wait until it get the chance to show its true colours. However, 2010 unfortunately made me very sceptical of those kinds of series that promise to get better later on. It felt like half of the long shows failed to do that despite the huge luxury in episodes they received: Heroman, Nurarihyon, Arakawa Under the Bridge and Index II all failed to live up to their promise to get better. Then there are the series like Kaichou wa Maid Sama which despite the fact that I dropped them early on, I really doubt that they were able to redeem themselves. On top of that there were Durarara and Letter Bee Reverse, which both decreased in quality during their second halves and Star Driver, which promised to get better, only to remain pretty much consistent throughout its entire run. There was only a relatively small fraction of 22-26-episoded that started in 2010 that actually made good use of all of its build-up (Giant Killing, Rainbow, Denyuuden, Uragiri and Shiki).

That’s why I’m really glad that so many long series this season seem to head into the right direction, but as long as they don’t I unfortunately have to remain a bit (okay, very) sceptical.
Rating: *** (Awesome)

Deadman Wonderland – 09

by psgels, posted in Deadman Wonderland



So this wasn’t meant to be the most surprising episode: right from the start it was clear that everything would go to hell in this episode, with a traitor right in the middle of everything, just about every part of the plan was set to be sabotaged and brutally murdered, which is exactly what happened.

And yeah, I guess that the way in which Ganta survived was pretty plausible. On top of being lucky enough to have the single most powerful character in the series as his ally, he also was the only child in this operation: it makes sense for the others to want to protect him, and at least make him end up outside. The whole explosion also made sure that the priest didn’t just go and murder him on the spot. Really, as long as things remain this way I have no problems with it. This show just needs to avoid pulling another Olympic medallist.

Also, the death scenes: they also were well done. The fact remains that Ganta went together with just a bunch of unnamed characters, but this episode made sure to at least give them a character as a group, and highlight some of their personalities even though we don’t know anything about them. I was actually surprised that some of them actually survived (but then again the question will be for how long? I really hope that this show won’t see them as just cannon fodder after this point).

Also, the gore. This episode did not have any particularly well animated scenes, but it’s here where the script and scenarios were enough for the disturbance factor.

In any case, Manglobe: in terms of the biggest flaw of anime (ending in the middle of the storyline), this season has been really generous: out of all of the series that are about to end, only Deadman Wonderland really need a continuation, since TWGOK at the very least just got an OVA announced. Incidentally, both are Manglobe series. The manga at the very least still seems to sell surprisingly well, but I stopped uselessly anticipating these unannounced sequels a long time ago. I’ve just seen too many awesome series that didn’t get their continuation.

At the very least though: Deadman Wonderland will not be a pointless series. This past season has had enough points that made it worth watching. That’s quite rare for the series of this length.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Ao no Exorcist – 09

by psgels, posted in Ao no Exorcist



And here Ao no Exorcist proves that it too can write a great climax. It’s a bit late compared to the other shows this season, but heck: this episode rocked. It showed that the formula of this series definitely works.

This episode was rock-solid: The previous episodes just made it seem that Satan started to send his minions to fetch Rin. This episode however revealed that there was much more to it than just that, and evolved into an exam that got out of hand. This too is a staple of shounen series, but rarely do we see it executed so short but sweet.

And here’s the thing with this series: it was annoying to get through, but I’m really enjoying the characters right now.In fact, the dynamics between Rin, Yukio and the others really culminated together in this episode, above how this episode flowed really nicely from one twist to the other. Heck, even the two characters who had been silent up till now finally spoke and added some charms to this episode. Now that’s a great sign!

It’s also here where this series shows that the motivations for the main character to get stronger are much better than usual. Becoming the best or getting power to protect someone, they all have this been there done that mentality, not to mention that just that can become really one-sided. Rin doesn’t exactly want to protect: he wants his enemies to stop involving innocent people. That’s a lot more interesting to watch. And of course I’m not asking for every show to have a deep background for its character (heck, the lead of the Law of Ueki, one of my favourite shounen series ever has the simple motivation of wanting to win a contest), I’m asking for it to be interesting: toy with it; show other characters who can relate to that, use it to get into interesting situations. This episode was a major step into the right direction for Ao no Exorcist. Now keep this up!
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Tiger & Bunny – 11

by psgels, posted in Tiger & Bunny



Haha, the creators actually found a use for Origami’s powers! Usually when a character has weak or unusual powers, the creators hardly ever make full use of them. And this episode did exactly what I hoped with Origami by turning him into a spy.

My only complaint is that he’s a bit of a bad actor. Apart from that this episode was all about the parts about Superheroes that don’t involve fighting: hostages, public relationships, politics and infiltration. It was a nerve wrecking episode because of how easily the villains would be able to kill off half the city if they run into something they don’t like. The part after the ED shows that Origami indeed had been found out, so who knows what could happen to him? This arc so far has looked really eager to subvert some superhero tropes.

Also, I love how at first, this series appeared to have all sorts of convenient plotholes… that actually make perfect sense. Now that’s some good writing here. If Ouroboros is indeed in control of some of the most powerful figures in the city, then these people as opposed to Origami Cyclone, are some great actors.

Oh and this episode also revealed something major about the backstory of this series: the original hero guy? He’s dead right now. This gives a very interesting twist to his whole backstory: was he aware about the corruption in the city when he was still working? Or did he die fighting that exact corruption?
Rating: ** (Excellent)

X-Men – 10

by psgels, posted in X-Men




Seriously, now this is what I’m expecting out f a great action series. This episode filled in what this show had been missing so far: an engaging storyline. It finally revealed why everyone had been doing the things they did, and it worked wonderfully. It was a bit of a wait (heck, the series will be over in just two episodes), but this episode was exactly what this show needed to really put that sense of urgency to the whole conflict. I admit, Sasaki Yui turned out to be a great villain.

Now, this episode did have a few problems, but those are just minor bugs. It’s a bit strange why everyone just stood around casually chatting while the big bad guy was already getting his hands o the ultimate super weapon. They were lucky that he was waiting for his subordinate to arrive or he could have just left without any of them noticing.

a subordinate who looks downright creepy by the way. What I also liked about this episode was that despite the fact that it was an exposition episode, it still had plenty of action that just kept moving forward. In fact, that’s always been the strength of this show: the way it balances its action. There’s neither too little nor too much, and what’s there delivers. This episode only reinforced my beliefs that this show has the best animation of the season.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Gosick – 21

by psgels, posted in Gosick



Interestingly this was the kind of episode that started off rather dodgy, only to redeem itself as it went on. It’s strange, but as the episode went on I caught myself getting irked at quite a few things, and yet when the episode ended it justified all but one of them.

So let’s just get the one wonky part about this episode out of the way first: I usually really like it when a series tells its story through a play, but this was a rather silly example of this trope. The entire play was silent, only to be narrated by the audience. That… didn’t mesh in the slightest.

Also, as Victorique explained the mystery of the Coco Rose, something really felt missing. The whole story just didn’t match up to the previous arcs. So of course she only told part of the truth as a refusal to cooperate with the ones who tried to use her. It really begs the question as to why her father put so much faith into her, but this was actually a pretty good strategy of her to just break this faith and getting him to lose interest in her. Right now she has found an ally in Kujou, which allowed her to do the thing she previously couldn’t do out of fear of being alone.

The way in which Victorique suddenly announced that Leviathan was the daughter of the queen was completely random, made no sense and only made the Leviathan story less interesting, so I’m glad too that that was a lie. My guess is that somewhere, she read that the queen had a servant who looked just like her, and with that she was able to piece everything together as soon as she found out about the baby she had. The way in which they just “bumped” into the real queen at the end was… convenient to say the least, but it was a great way to close off this arc and fill up the gaps.

The Coco Rose still isn’t the most interesting arc of Gosick, but it still turned out to be much better than expected. With three episodes left, the finale will probably start next episode. I originally thought that the final arc would just flow out of the Coco Rose arc, but instead this episode left us with a really bored main villain and the main characters returning home.

Instead we’ll be getting a short final arc of only three episodes. It’s here where the creators of the anime need to show what they’re worth: short finals are either awesome or really rushed.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Hyouge Mono – 10

by psgels, posted in Hyouge Mono



I will be talking about major spoilers right here, so people who are still following the subs (really, do give it a chance despite their slowness! This show is much, much harder to translate than any other series this season) might want to look away. I warned you. This sentence is meant to prevent spoilers from showing up in aggregator sites.

That was one of the most badass deaths I’ve ever seen. I mean, holy crap. I never expected the creators to kill off Oda Nobunaga this early in this series despite being the second most important character in the series, but the way in which he went was just completely mind-blowing. His final words were just the epitome of manliness. I couldn’t pick up whether that pot he obtained had anything to do with it, but either way: the beginning of this episode was just incredible.

And besides that, this completely changes everything about this series. Sasuke now finds himself without the master he’s been loyal to for sixteen years now (that was the right number, right?), and if I’m not mistaken, he has gotten dangerously close to accessing one of those three so-called legendary ceramics. What the hell is the rest of this series going to be about!?

The pacing also was just amazing. The slow way in which every scene played out was an amazing build-up, plus the graphics also were better than ever. I can’t believe how smooth the animation got at certain points here: that was like, completely fluid. The creators really did a wonderful job in order to bring this story to life, and the direction also was just fantastic, creating an impeccable atmosphere. I’ll stop now before I run out of adjective. Bottom-like: one of the riskiest and most unique shows of the season showed here once again that it’s one of my favourite shows of the season.
Rating: **** (Fantastic)

[C] The Money of Soul and Possibility Control – 09

by psgels, posted in The Money of Soul and Possibility Control



Yeah, this was rushed, but then again, it already was clear that C was too ambitious for Noitamina. At the very least though, it hasn’t followed the same path as Eden of the East: this series has not slowed down, and instead of skipping things, it’s trying to do as much as possible in the time it has remaining.

But heck, this show is rushed, but at the very least it’s still able to get its messages across. That for me puts it ahead of shows like Eden of the East which too was ambitious but just got its entire pacing wrong when trying to fit its story in its limited time, and Kuragehime which just gave up at the final episode.

But I have to praise everything around Mikuni in this episode: this episode showed him sacrificing the country’s future (read: children) in order to catch the shock-wave that was caused from the south east Asia market. It was both wonderfully directed and it continues to flesh out the whole setting here. And heck, loaning out your future sounds very abstract, but what most people are doing here is actually loaning out their children for money. There still are many questions here, for example it keeps getting hinted that Mashu is Kimimaro’s daughter, but then it makes no sense that his father walked around with one as well.

The weak point of this episode was the drama around Kimimaru, or at least that’s what I thought when watching this episode. Thinking back, it’s just poorly acted. The reason the kiss felt weird was because the animation was very wonky and the dialogue clunky. In terms of character development they did exactly what they needed to and strengthened the plot by showing what Mikuni did to the people of Japan. The acting is still bad, but I’m really surprised that this show hasn’t fallen apart under the weight of its own plot yet. And that’s the thing it needs to remember: yeah it’s flawed, but as long as it doesn’t run into a wall it can still end up as a really worthwhile series. The big pitfall for this one right now is leaving a bad aftertaste: the final episode will be crucial for this one.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Dororon Enma-kun Meerameera – 10

by psgels, posted in Spring 2011 Kaleidoscope



These final weeks I’m going to be revisiting my favourites of the past season that I didn’t blog, or any other particularly awesome episode that pops up. This week’s episode of Enma-kun was completely crazy, so I couldn’t pass up this chance. It’s also a good point to talk about the comedies in this season in general.

Because there have been quite a few comedies this season: aside from Enma, there was Gintama, Hen Zemi, Azazel-San, Sket Dance, Fireball, plus the half-comedies of Hyouge Mono and Tiger & Bunny, and those are just the ones that made me laugh. With this many series out there to get some laughs, especially for the pure comedies, it’s certainly difficult to find any lasting impact: what series will be remembered years after this season?

I think that here, it’s going to matter a lot what series managed to set themselves apart. Especially with so many sequels, this matters even more: can these series really prove that they were worth it to expand further upon. And I think that here, Gintama, Hen Zemi and Azazel-san pulled on the short end: Gintama’s comedy episodes have mostly been pointless and instead it should have just stuck with its serious arcs, which really are good. Hen Zemi meanwhile never really succeeded to step outside of the OVA’s shadow. Yeah it added nice things to the characters, but overall it’s not enough to gain any lasting impact. Azazel-san meanwhile is too inconsistent: Moloch was brilliant, but too often I get the idea that the creators lacked inspiration for good episodes and characters. It’s the kind of one trick pony comedy that it unfortunately couldn’t avoid.

The ones that set themselves apart the most were Fireball Charming, which improved upon the original with some great creativity and visuals, and Enma-Kun, who despite being completely juvenile had consistently the best ideas of the pure comedies this season, added to how incredibly entertaining it has turned out. It’s the kind of roller-coaster ride that never leaves a room for taking a breath, and this episode was one of the best episodes so far. It once again was wrong on so many levels but its huge amount of energy made it one heck of an enjoyable ride.

And the episode was basically the lead characters trying to turn the home base of the Youkai Patrol into a giant robot and screwing up horribly in the process, with just bout everything going wrong, and somehow this lead to some of the funniest scenarios I’ve seen this season so far. Especially Kappaeru was hilarious: both when he was randomly goofing off in the background and whenever he kept eating important plot devices. When he first appeared in this series I really hated this guy: he really looked like the usual pointless side-kick. So okay, he turned out to be a parody of that. And I must say that it was a hilarious one: in just about every episode since the third he has been hilariously useless.

Also, what the hell did the creators do to poor Yuki here? An angels are actually those stereotypical Americans? What the hell?

The trend for comedies in 2010 and 2011 has definitely been to explore taboos. It’s nothing new what this series is doing right now: there have been a lot of series about toilet humour by now. It is an interesting trend, though. At first you might think that all of these series are just trying to jump on a bandwagon with uninspired series. And that’s indeed how this started: I believe that Juuden-chan was the kick-starter, realizing that both Gintama and Kanokon were surprisingly successful, it too tried to push its boundaries. What followed were more utterly horrid fanservice shows of Chu Bra, Ladies Versus Butlers and Qwaser, so yeah: it seemed like a terrible trend began.

After that however, series started to jump the bandwagon that actually challenged each other, and pushed each other to explore these boundaries in interesting and funny ways: first there were Mitsudomoe and the Hen Zemi OVA, then Panty and Stocking came along, Milky Holmes aired, and suddenly these series that supposedly had toilet humour ranked themselves amongst the better comedies each season. There’s a ton of stuff happening in this genre and the shows are pushing each other to produce new and interesting stuff. Even Hen Zemi and Azazel-san, while they won’t have any lasting impact, do feel fresh and come with something interesting that doesn’t make me abandon them. This actually is pretty healthy competition here.
Rating: *** (Awesome)

Ano Hi Mita Hana no Namae o Boku-Tachi wa Mada Shiranai. – 09

by psgels, posted in Ano Hi Mita Hana no Namae o Boku-Tachi wa Mada Shiranai



Ah, it’s almost a shame that there are just two episodes left, but that’s the strength of a good Noitamina-series: they’re short, but really, really sweet. This episode was the calm before the storm: preparing everything for that finale, and it’s promising to become an awesome one that is going to involve every single character significantly.

I really liked how both Jinta and Poppo nearly broke their character. Unlike Yukiatsu who isn’t afraid to show his personal feelings or Naruko who is terrible at hiding them, both of them have been quite good at dodging these things. This time, even that composure broke. Especially Jinta, who right now is the one threatening to screw everything up.

As to the “big plothole” of this series, I think that it has a lot to do with this. While it remains questionable why Menma waited so long on announcing her presence, it is clear now why Jinta didn’t push her to do that: it’s pretty much as Yukiatsu said; Jinta wants to stay with Menma and wants to have her for himself, while at the same time he still has parts of the attention whore that he was when he was younger.

Meanwhile, Tsuruko also finally showed some new things of herself. She really is going to be a big mystery for that ending as well: she’s the most composed member of the cast so she really had relatively few scenes to show her character off compared to the more unstable characters, but with Yukiatsu getting stranger and stranger (he’s also hitting on Naruko now? Is this because he’s interested in her or because he just wants to take everything away from Jinta?) we finally get to see that she too has at least a crush. Her character was invaluable to the series, though. It showed that the cast wasn’t entirely made up out of people with issues. It was exactly what the cast needed here for variety.
Rating: ** (Excellent)