Shinrei Tantei Yakumo – 08

by psgels, posted in Shinrei Tantei Yakumo



A building up episode, but nevertheless a really solid one. It’s here where we finally get to see the “mystery”-part of this series, because the entire episode was full of twists and revelations to spice up this arc. It’s a bit weird at times, but that also gave this show a bit of a charm. Yakumo’s past suddenly got a lot more intriguing here, and I’m beginning to see what the creators were building up for here.

It’s also an episode who completely removes some of the key lead characters: Yakumo only appears in one shot, while Gotou is nowhere to be found at all. I like these kinds of episodes, as they really give the side-cast their time to shine, and in this episode they really show that they’re more than a useless bunch. Especially that wimpy detective gets some background and development and also Haruka was very different from back when she still got kidnapped every other episode.

I do have to wonder which police office keeps secret files hidden behind a toilet, of all things. This episode also returned to the quick-fire pacing of this series which feels like the creators tried to stuff a ton of material into just twenty episodes. Again though: it works. You can say a lot about this series, but it definitely doesn’t drag on.

The fact that Yakumo is the child born off a rape victim makes a lot of sense in the story, and only ends up making that bad guy even more of an asshole, establishing him now as an uncaught rapist. It’s still a complete mystery about what he’s planning to do with him though, but it probably involves the spirit seeing powers that he has. The bond between his mother and Haruka’s mother is a bit coincidental, but on the other hand, it’s entirely possible for Haruka’s mother to send Haruka towards Yakumo. I doubt she knew about the extent of the practices that Yakumo was involved in, and instead probably tried to prevent Yakumo from really losing his way.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Heartcatch Precure – 40

by psgels, posted in Heartcatch Precure



Just when I thought that this show couldn’t get any better… and it surpasses itself. Yet again. I mean, I’m running out of superlatives here, the previous episode made it seem like it was going to quietly build up until the final climax, and instead here this show comes with one of its best episodes so far. How the hell do these creators keep doing this?

It’s exactly as I hoped though: the final quarter of this series really is going to focus on the bad guys. But holy crap, to think that they already finished off one of them at this stage… what the hell do they have in store for the rest of these episodes? Sasorina’s end was incredibly sad, especially with the twist that she pretty much was just another Desatorian.

I mean, this is hard core for a kids’ show: they pretty much put three people (perhaps even five, if the same is true for Sabaaku and Dark Precure…) into a coma for more than a year. Sasorina was a fun and quirky character to follow throughout these past forty episodes, but things get a completely new dimension here when you think at how all this time, there was her body lying around in a coma, waiting for the Precures to heal her heart. It’s a fantastic way to develop her character, and I also loved the subtle parts that Kumojacky and Cobraja played in this episode.

Also, the creators also found a solution of keeping this show from becoming too epic and losing its charms. There have a been a lot of different things turned into Desatorians over the past few episodes. But an entire freaking school building?! That’s just cool on so many levels. On top of that, the story of this episode was also a really charming one that actually used an overused anime trope really well. There have been plenty of series by now who had this underdog who suddenly gets powers and authority for himself, and he starts daydreaming of how to absolutely not use these powers. It’s annoying and overdone, and yet I loved how maturely this show treated this by really showing that he knows better after getting scolded by Itsuki about it.

Oh yeah, and Itsuki also deciding to retire as the student council president. These are the kinds of things you expect at a penultimate episodes and we’ve still got ten episodes left!
Rating: **** (Fantastic)

Star Driver – 08

by psgels, posted in Star Driver




So I thought that the creators would make Sugata as an antagonist a long-running theme of this series. Apparently though, they just intended this arc as a part of his character-development and in terms of that, this arc really served its purpose: we definitely got to know more about Sugata during the past episodes, even though he was such a silent character before this arc.

Also beyond my expectations: the cage girl left. I mean, she finished her story, left her cage and at the end of the episode she’s on a boat away from the island. I seriously have no idea what to make of that because this series really likes to play with that: there have been plenty of times at which it hinted to put characters on a bus, only to immediately bring them back and characters who looked like they were important at first sight got put on a bus instead. And don’t get me wrong, I really like that unpredictable side of this series.

The battle of this episode was a typical manly fight, with lots of morals and one liners. Perhaps it was a bit cheesy, but it definitely worked as a good conclusion to Sugata’s arc. Samekh’s power is apparently too much for the Pink-haired girl to handle, which does mnake me worried whether or not the creators are god-moding Sugata a little too much here, but there still are plenty of ways for them to write themselves out of that corner. I’m especially interested in what happened to that Pink-haired girl: we did not see her exit her chamber and hand in her badge. So much for being formulaic, eh?
Rating: ** (Excellent)

First Lustrum: Star Crossed Five Year Anniversary

by psgels, posted in Special Articles

Today, Star Crossed is celebrating its first lustrum: it’s already been five years ago since I made my first posts here (very fanboyishly crappy posts, if I may confess). Like all previous years, I always do these anniversary posts with some statistics and amusing search terms:

General Statistics:
Up till now, I’ve made 3822 posts and regularly blogged 139 different television series.
The site has been received 5147999 unique visitors, which consist out of 2912603 first time visitors and 2235716 returning ones. This year alone the site got 863064 first time visitors and 891717 returning ones, and this was the first time since the creation of the site that the amount of returning visitors was larger than the amount of first time ones, so I really want to thank everyone for coming back here.
27075 comments have been posted (again, many thanks to everyone who posted one).

Top-10 Most Accessed Series of the Past Year:
10. Aoi Bungaku
9. Baccano!
8. Les Miserables – Shoujo Cosette
7. Darker than Black – Ryuusei no Gemini
6. Heartcatch Precure
5. Higurashi no Naku Koro ni
4. Durarara
3. Ergo Proxy
2. Armed Librarians – The Book of Bantorra
1. Full Metal Alchemist – Broptherhood

Top-10 Most Accessed Posts:
10. Full Metal Alchemist – The Blind Alchemist OVA
9. Top 25 Favourite OPs
8. Full Metal Alchemist – Brotherhood – 41
7. My Top 20 Favourite Anime
6. Autumn Season Preview
5. Summer Season Preview
4. Full Metal Alchemist – Brotherhood – 52
3. Darker than Black Review – 87/100
2. 2000-2009 – Decade Summary Part 1
1. Top 10 Anime (The old one)

Top-20 Google Keywords: (aside from the obvious ones as “psgels”, “star crossed” and variations of “top 10 anime”) (aka. the internet is weird)
20. heroic age review
19. tono to issho
18. full metal alchemist brotherhood 51
17. pandora hearts review
16. full metal alchemist brotherhood 41
15. angel beats review
14. casshern sins review
13. towards the terra
12. mouryou no hako
11. hen zemi
10. school days review
9. darker than black ova
8. clannad review
7. eden of the east review
6. xxxholic rou
5. that anime blog
4. blassreiter review
3. hakuouki – (Why? I only blogged three measly episodes…)
2. aoi bungaku
1. darker than black review

Amusing Search Terms (people are actually searching for these things?)
hi you are under arrest for watching anime since all anime are child pornography acccording to us immigrations – One reason why I’m glad not to live in the US…

how much is star crossed anime blog worth – Eh, believe me: not much.

training with hinako psgels – You really want me to review that thing? O.o

bleach manga writer commit suicide – Is this just wishful thinking or something?

anime like junjo romantica heterosexual partners – Eh… doesn’t that defeat the entire purpose of that series?

identical twin boy and girl – How is that even possible?

anime jesus milk alchemy -fullmetal – I honestly have no idea what this guy was hoping to find…

does 16+74=100?
what is 82.5% out of a 100
85 reversed is 58 – Just a sample of the completely moronic math questions that people actually dare to ask Google… and who somehow end up redirected to this site.

i went to saw a sea – You would have needed a pretty big saw in order to be able to do that…

leo leo leo leo goddammit – dammit, leo leo leo

laaa la la laaa la la laaa la la laaa la la la la laaa summer hit – Did you seriously think that typing that into google would give you the title of that song?

famous girl with a p in frontname and h in lastname – Again, Google is no crystal ball or anything…

how to stop congratulation you won – Get a decent spam blocker!

how old should i be to wathch ginga denseta weed – That really is a hardcore series, you shouldn’t watch it when you’re young.

iai am told by a medium that she sees me as a medium with strong powers but i dont know it what should i do – Eh, run away from her as fast as possible. And stop being so damn gullible.

please i want a message,dere dis girl i might she has been refusing my friendship so i want a messege dat will blow her mind. – This is one of the weirdest ways to search for pick-up lines I’ve ever seen…

why do christians think anime is evil for? – Probably the satanic messages.

why is it that everytime i have confrontations with my husband i’m always the one to blame? – Because you keep asking Google for it.

how to have anime legs – Why would you want that?

is there any anime that has stories in the episodes
how would katanagatari look if it was drawn – Pointless questions are pointless

85 differents asses, 85 differents flavours
“high things” things-things sexy anime
i got a potato put in my pussy (anime)
gay anime hard yaoi blog
anime metal penis – You people have dirty minds. And these aren’t even the most disturbing results that I ended up finding. Cannot unsee!

when a guy send his bodyguard to watch me what does it mean – It means that you’re in trouble.

why am i darker than what im supposed to be – Uh, because you spend too much time sunbathing?

+i rather be woman than black – …

oh, good lord! it’s unbelievable. it’s horrible. i can’t understand the reason for such cruelty – Me neither!

can kids under 18 buy hetalia – Oh lord… talk about overreacting.

how to start a dollars gang?
how to make dollars site durarara – You know you’re too much of a Durarara fan when you actively start searching for these things on Google.

how do i entertain my hyper dog in the morning
this dog is definitely on some kind of drug
anime were dogs get hit – These results all appeared at different times, but it would be amusing if they were made by the same person…

do you need to wear makeup as sebastian from kuroshitsuji – When you’re Sebastian, you don’t need any makeup to look good.

anime with mass suicide superpowers – “I will now use my superpowers to kill myself in a completely overblown fashion!”

people are so realistic – Don’t you agree?

how are you doing? i’m just bored about to watch an anime… sora no otoshimono.. anyways i hope we can be friends and all. ^^ – Did this kid seriously confuse Google with some kind of instant messenger?

star crossed anime – psgels vegetarian – I am not a vegetarian. I like meat.

i see you keep a bee – Keeping a single bee takes up a lot of work.

if a gemini calls you crazy and goes cold for no reason – I seriously have no idea what that means.

how to write an email to yu aida – The author of Gunslinger Girl? Eh, find out his email address and send him a message?

is italy in hetalia gay – Take a guess…

fucking spoons! how do they work? – Yes, who are the bastards who designed these things?

i want to be a pretty cure – Good for you.

making money blog transmute alchemy – Do you seriously think that that’ll work?

if you are 5 or 82, there is something you can do…. – I don’t want to know that “something” you’re referring to…

is it wrong to watch yuri anime – Yes. Lesbians are evil and should be banned from television!

asdffgmj – How did you end up here?

9/11bombers still alive – Yes, they crashed two airplanes into the Twin Towers and walked away from the rubble without a scratch.

code geass is true story? – Whahahahahha! Good one.

Letter Bee – 33

by psgels, posted in Letter Bee




This episode just blew all of my expectations here. It was both gorgeous and really well told: it just kept revealing more and more about what happened to Nichi in her past. I loved how it used all these legends and stories, not to mention Gauche’s involvement which turned out to have nothing to do with all of those, to twist around this episode.

For once the villagers seemed genuinely helpful, yet their ancestors were so misguided that the stories of what happened became a totally misguided tale of what happened. The village chief seems to be the only one who knew the truth of how Nichi and her twin sister (the fact that Nichi has a twin sister also came as one hell of a surprise, by the way) were thrown into a frozen lake. This episode was already amazing, and we haven’t even seen the parts that really focus on Nichi yet: that’s left for next week (which really is going to be a very annoying wait here…).

Also, Gauche: what was he doing in that cave? And why didn’t he visit Maka? Was that Gaichu so important for his plans? What makes them so important and why don’t they exist anywhere else? And what the hell? Lag isn’t human? Talk about using Nichi as a red herring for that one: it was of course established that Lag is special because of the way he appeared in front of Gauche and all, but I never really took that much notice of it because of how strange Nichi was. Next thing you’ll tell me is that Steak is actually the long lost pet of the One who couldn’t become a Spirit or something…

It’s strange, but the more I write about this episode, the more I’m awed by all of its intricacies, and how much it deepens the plot of this series. It was a truly excellent example of how to do the reveal episodes in a mystery-series: answer a few key questions while creating a ton of intrigue around it, making the revelations creative and yet not too far-fetched.

The art in this episode was also absolutely gorgeous. It first started with that incredibly stylish background, but dear god: Maka’s designs were absolutely amazing. The entire color scheme of this episode formed such a wide contrast with the usual visuals of this series that it made them stand out even more.
Rating: *** (Awesome)

Bakuman – 08

by psgels, posted in Bakuman



This was really looking out to be my favourite episode of Bakuman thus far, but I didn’t really like the ending. That annoying classmate was a bit too much here in a series that tries to be realistic. It was a bit of a cheap way to create drama, and this show doesn’t need him. I mean, there are assholes and all, but this guy is just a caricature.

The rest of this episode impressed me, though. It was all about the psychology of the two leads: they’ve passed their fist big hurdle, but how do they keep themselves professional enough to keep writing? This episode was entirely meant to flesh out the flaws of the two leads and it definitely made them more interesting to watch.

On top of that, in the end the story they came up with (which indeed was both visually and in terms of its concept more interesting) got rejected. In the end it remains a competition between other manga authors to compete for a spot inside a magazine, and apparently the producers found the other premises more interesting. I’m really interested in the manga story that the creators eventually do find interesting enough to publish.

This episode also was about Moritaka’s worries of his art being not good enough. Compared to the pilot, his art has also gotten quite detailed, but to me it seems like the thing he’s looking for is inspiration. At the same time, I think that he’s also unrightfully thinking that he’s miles behind Akito’s writing, after all it’s one thing to come up with a premise, but the real challenges for Akito are to weave an entire story around it.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

OVA Impressions: Armored Trooper Votoms – Phantom Arc – 05

by psgels, posted in Armored Trooper Votoms - Phantom Arc, OVA Impressions



That was just absolutely amazing. Both this franchise and this OVA keep just heading in new and different directions, and yet at the same time this OVA is also bringing together the different parts of the series. This episode really embodied the things that made the mystery-parts of the Votoms-franchise so awesome: it just keeps throwing you in new settings and situations that are completely original.

It was a building-up episode, but it did that extremely well with its atmosphere. This child of god gets even more intriguing than it already was now that it got abducted by those strange huge bugs, who seem to know exactly what to do with it, along with that girl who turned out to be a previous Child of God, who managed to survive for god knows how many places, suggesting that these children of god are some sort of immortal, which is pretty believable considering how Wiseman lived for 3000 years.

And yet that makes Chirico even more intriguing, as he’s supposed to be even above these deities. I also loved all of the religious subtext that this episode again brought to the table. Religion in Votoms was always something vague, yet very much real. It never really was explained what exactly Chirico’s powers are, and yet his destiny plays a key part here: wherever he goes, something really important happens and everyone wants to be a part of it. At first sight Chirico seems to be nothing more than yet another variation on the Gundam-esque Newtypes, but his nature lies far deeper than that.

Oh, and what I also really liked was that the creators finally showed a bit more depth to the scene in which Pailsen tried to burn Chirico. It’s now revealed that he burned the entire research institute in which he was gathering potential Abnormal Survivors, and I think that that’s the point in which Pailsen really found out about Chirico. I’m especially intrigued by that boy and girl who ran towards each other, and what their relationship with Chirico was. And again, I loved how mature Chirico reacted to it.

We really need more series like this in the future. Heck, the Gen-ei hen has pretty much become my favourite OVA of 2010, and to think that there still are one episode, one movie and two side-story movies left. the entire Votoms franchise really is something unique. The animation could have been better, but ah, who cares? It’s nowhere near bad enough to ruin the rest of this experience.
OVA Episode Rating: 8,75/10

Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu – 20

by psgels, posted in Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu



Again: a really good episode. I mean, it really took a while for this series to get going, but it’s quite excellent at this point with very few weaknesses left. Ryner’s angst ten episodes ago was still rather annoying. Right now though, with an entire episode dedicated to it, it really shined again: this was such a bittersweet episode for such a seemingly jolly fantasy series.

There is no real good and evil in this series, but the biggest asshole is without a doubt that short-haired Gastark guy. The things that he does in this episode were just… depressing beyond belief, especially after how often this series has reminded us how much the people with the Alpha Stigma have been suffering in the past.

The parts that really made this episode for me was when Ferris got in the picture, though. After 20 episodes, she finally got the chance to yell something other at Ryner than her usual random insults. It’s about time that the relationship between these two developed, and the past episode did a wonderful job there.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Shiki – 16

by psgels, posted in Shiki



This series… every time I think that the turning point is about to arrive, the Shiki prove me wrong by only nibbling away even more lives. I mean, how many characters at this point are still un-bitten by the vampires? I can only tihnk of Toshio, Toshio’s mother, the three remaining nurses, Seishin and his parents, the awesome beard guy and his wife and Kaori. That’s only eleven characters left, out of who knows how many this show started with.

This series makes excellent use of this hopelessness: this episode was mainly meant to give the Shiki some background, and yet at the same time it went back to the despair when Tatsumi trashed all hopes of Akira of being able to fight back. Just one shot of him was enough for that.

The background of course was very appreciated as well. It’s interesting that Sunako, and not the two vampires I thought to be her parents, turned out to be the mastermind behind everything. Up till now, the biggest potential pitfall for Shiki was shallow main villains, because of the relatively little time that has been spent on this threesome, so I’m glad that at least Sunako has gotten a bit more depth here.

This episode also provided a great view into what Shiki think like: they mostly retain their personality, but what changes them the most is their thirst for blood and attacking people. This leads them to attack their loved ones, in the hope of getting them to the other side. Now, the question remains: what makes special vampires? Why did Natsuno and Tatsumi rise up as vampires who have no problems with Sunlight? Is that random, or do certain conditions have to be met? And if that’s the latter, did the Shiki avoid meeting those conditions in order to have something to manipulate their subordinates with?
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Kuragehime – 05

by psgels, posted in Kuragehime



This episode did exactly what I hoped to: instead of goofing off, it wasted no time in pushing the plot forward. Instead of waiting until the penultimate episode for the Sisterhood to actually stand up and do something, it brings in the news that Chieko’s mother is planning to sell the place. That was exactly what this series needed to prevent it from getting stale.

This episode itself was also a complete chaos with the amount of things that happened at the same time: Tsukimi was too busy being love-sick, the sisterhood made a failed attempt to speak up at a council meeting, a newly introduced woman starts hitting on Shuu and Kuranosuke starts his attempts on giving the entire sisterhood a huge make-over. Every part of this was just full of energy, and I especially liked the parts of the episode that tried to mix all of these together, which made this episode juggle all kinds of emotions. It’s one of the rare points at which you can really see that this is from the same director as Baccano and Durarara, as Takehiro may be one of the most versatile directors out there: it feels like his style changes with every series he’s working on.

Unlike the previous episode we didn’t get to see into Shuu’s mind this time, which probably was a build-up for the next number of episodes, because we don’t know exactly what kind of impact the previous episode made on him. This episode portrayed him as relatively normal, but at the same time we also don’t really know what kind of impact that woman made on him (who by the way is quite a character: the personalities she creates for the people she manipulates sound so fake when you consider her real character): was she meant as a character to develop him, Tsukimi or both?
Rating: *** (Awesome)