Uragiri wa Boku no Namae wo Shitteiru – 20

by psgels, posted in Uragiri wa Boku no Namae wo Shitteiru



Holy crap! I’m impressed here. This could pretty much be the best episode of Uragiri so far. It’s really amazing how this episode stood out when it mostly involved characters we only really got to know one episode ago.

When Yuki ran off for Luka I expected another silly conflict. But instead this episode just kept building up its tension more and more. Every time at which I thought that the episode hit its climax, it just went even further. The build-up here was absolutely terrific, there was no minute wasted. The episode started out really quiet with actually some really effective piano music. After that point, there was hardly any break to allow the viewer to catch a bit of breath.

Looking back, the point at which Kuroto told Senshiro to quit was really powerful. After four years of hardships. This choice between protecting someone or protecting yourself from getting involved is nothing new in anime, but because it’s such a major theme in this series it’s really working here. I mean, half the cast in this series is struggling with that exact question, but all under different circumstances.

Also, during the second half, I really like how the creators subverted the “sudden save”-cliche. I’ve seen so many of those scenes in which characters are driven to the brink of defeat, only for someone who was looking for them to arrive at the exact right time. The second half of this episode had three or four of those moments, and yet Luka arrived too late to do anything here. Every time, the save was made by either Yuki, Kuroto, Senshiro or Reiga; all of which were fairly believable. Reiga’s appearance at the end. He may have just been sitting in the shadows. Really: what were his intentions back then? Doesn’t he want Yuki to die or something?
Rating: *** (Awesome)

Sengoku Basara – 19

by psgels, posted in Sengoku Basara



Well, I think that this is the curse of this series: build up. This was another episode with just four minute of fighting, with the rest of the airtime devoted to building up. We know at this point that this has awesome results: just look at the previous episode. Unlike the first season, the build up here actually gets realized, and is more than worth it. But yeah, this episode wasn’t much special.

I mean, seriously: it’s obvious right now that the creators are preparing themselves for the showdown between Toyotomi, Masamune and Yukimura. At this point it’s really making sure that these guys have enough to show in that final episodes. Those are two episodes that I’m really looking forward to. At the same time, what could have made this series even better was if the creators would have found a way to make these kinds of episodes exciting as well. That is what really would have made this into an awesome action series.

I’m not sure what to think of that guy with the really weird haircut. At this point, I’ve seen too little of him, though the fight against him was a bit disappointing. As an ally against Toyotomi though, he might prove to be interesting.

Oh, and there’s a new ED. It’s a shame that the singer has this really cheesy voice because I like the visuals. They fit the series well, and it captures the different subplots of the second season very nicely.
Rating: * (Good)

To Aru Majutsu no Index Review – 77,5/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews



To Aru Majutsu no Index and Kagaku no Railgun. They’re both two series that I dropped very quickly when they first aired, though for completely different reasons. Railgun to me was genuinely annoying; I really don’t want to watch anything more of that. Index however… yeah. I dropped it because I had no idea what it was trying to be. “You want an interesting setting? Well, we’re too busy with action right now.” “You want action? Well, here are some long dialogues full of exposition.” “You want dialogues? Screw that! Here are some cute girls to annoy you!” It feels like all of those parts tried to cockblock each other.

Still, I have to admit: this series is based on some neat ideas, in which people can either have naturally born powers, or have to learn them as magic. The creators seemed to have put a lot of attention in coming up with interesting scenarios and backgrounds, so in another one of those “why not”-moments I gave this show a second chance. Overall, it’s a series that definitely has its moments, but as a standalone series I wouldn’t recommend it unless the upcoming second season really gets significantly better.

The series consists out of a number of different arcs, often completely unrelated, in which Touma (the lead character) saves a bunch of people (often cute girls). These arcs really vary from surprisingly good to completely pointless, and they can all be pretty much seen as separate entities. The worst for me were the Deep Blood and the Imaginary Number arcs. Both felt too forced, featured the worst characters of the series and felt completely pointless in the end. My personal favourite was the Angel Fall arc, because it’s that arc in which we actually learn the most about the lead character, Touma. I really liked what that arc added to his character.

The main weakness of Index isn’t the fact that all of these arcs are unrelated. In fact, this way the series can neatly show different kinds of aspects in its setting, explore its own magic system and show what its world looks like. No, my main problem with this series is that it’s so caught up in its own exposition that it often forgets its character.

So because of this, half the cast in Index is just a collection of walking plot devices. The creators are just so focused on progressing the story, and explaining the details behind the stories of the different arcs that they often forget the characterization, and half of the scenes that are allocated to fleshing out the characters have no idea how to do this so instead they just focus on the cute girls of the series and have them participate in really annoying antics. Granted though, the scenes that don’t involve action, tension, exposition or any of the cute teenaged girls are well written, and actually quite charming.

This show really does have some very neatly animated action scenes. You can also really see that the creators tried to spice those up to make them more than just a bunch of people zapping their powers at each other until one goes down: the battles here require some crazy tactics, and they really force the lead characters (the good guys, anyway) to think on their feet. I do have a big beef with them, though.

This is another one of those series in which characters can really have extreme powers: there are a ton of people walking around that can kill someone in the blink of a second, and the series itself reminds us of that very often. This brings along an extra layer of suspense of disbelief however, which is something that this series can’t live up to. I mean, it’s great that the series is trying to build up this atmosphere of serious business and all, but when Touma just keeps jumping into certain death situations, only to miraculously survive due to sheer luck that he couldn’t possibly have foreseen, it really destroys the tension a bit. I mean, the sheer amount of ludicrous saves in this series was just too much for my standards.

Apart from that though… it’s entertaining. There were a few episodes in which I really edged to just stop watching this series, but they were overshadowed by the episodes that did manage to keep my attention. I like this show for getting completely crazy at times with its ideas and scenarios, while I dislike it for having too much moe and one-dimensional characters. If the second season can use the build up that this season provided, I can easily see it get better. But it really needs to do something about these characters…

Storytelling: 8/10 – Interesting script, knows how to create tension.
Characters: 6/10 – Too many walking plot devices and annoying teenaged girls.
Production-Values: 9/10 – Very neat animation, especially during the action scenes. Nice soundtrack too.
Setting: 8/10 – Interesting concepts and ideas. Don’t go here for realism, though.

Suggestions:
– Betterman
– Night Head Genesis
– Hunter X Hunter

Heartcatch Precure – 28

by psgels, posted in Heartcatch Precure



For an episode that was about such a seemingly dull subject (summer homework), the creators somehow did it and made the characters even more adorable than they usually are. I mean, wow. You often see kids worry about summer homework in anime, but I like the twist this episode gave to it, when Cobraja got the chance to collect the desatorians of hundreds of kids who were worrying about not finishing it.

I mean, I’m really surprised at how well this episode worked, as it pretty much is a staple of the more cheaper kids’ series: a character is really lazy, slacks off and postpones this homework for way too long, or has some other fit saying how he or she hates homework. At the end of the episode then some message follows preaching how good it is to do your homework, etc. This episode handled it very tactfully though: instead of talking to the viewers, it talked to the characters. It was instead about this bridge that all kids their age need to cross: just doing the homework already.

Erika really was adorable in this episode, especially in the way that the creators portrayed her. I mean, there are so many different characters in anime complaining about homework, but this energy of her made her so enjoyable to watch as she throughout the entire episode tried to run away from it.

And by the way, this could be me because Cure Marin was having a bad day, but am I the only one who is seeing Cure Blossom changing? I mean, to me it really seems like she’s more and more able to follow Cure Sunshine, and actually learning from the way that Cure Sunshine fought. She feels much more controlled now. I think that’s because as a shy person, she often gets caught up in the pace of the one close to her. Previously this was Erika, but now that she really has gotten close to Itsuki it feels more and more like she feels closer to Itsuki now, compared to Erika. It may just be this episode though, which went out of its way to set Erika apart from the two others.
Rating: *** (Awesome)

Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu – 08

by psgels, posted in Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu



This episode was mostly centred around politics: the revolt of the nobles of Estabul. The revolt itself doesn’t seem to have that much of an impact on the story, and it seems more of an episode for the characters. we get a new character added to Shion’s group (whose character-designs unfortunately made that plot twist a bit too predictable), and Miran now is seen as someone who just disobeys Shion’s orders, causing Claugh to probably hate him for the rest of the series.

It was a pretty nice episode, though I do feel like it could have used a bit more build-up. It feels a bit… stereotypical right now, just meant to show how that new character is very righteous and gullible. I guess that with the rest of the cast, she is different from the rest of the characters, and I guess that the creators wanted a saint-like character like her, but I don’t like her yet.

In the meantime, the creators are continuing to build up Miran’s character, and they can’t just keep doing this for the entire rest of the series. I’m curious what the creators have in mind with him. Having said that, though, after five episodes I still have yet to see anything that matches up to episode 3. At this point, that’s the most dangerous for this series: what if it ends up never surpassing that particular episode? It’s an episode that created a lot of expectations, but will the future episodes be able to live up to them?
Rating: (Enjoyable)

Kuroshitsuji II – 08

by psgels, posted in Kuroshitsuji II



…

It’s like the creators made the first episodes crap on purpose.

Seriously, the creators had pure gold with Alois, and yet for some reason they dedicated for consecutive episodes on the silly adventures of Ciel&co. I mean, this episode was awesome. It’s hard to imagine that it came from the same creators as the ones who wrote that silly random flood in the second episode.

I mean, where to begin. This episode was all about Alois’ back-story, and it fully played with the insanity of this character, and how it came to grow. On top of that, the whole backstory behind everything also reached the point in which it actually gets interesting. Alois wants Ciel because Sebastian killed his younger brother in the past? It’s quite interesting to see that he has completely different goals from Claude. Not to mention Alois ACTUALLY DYING at the end of this episode. Bloody hell!? What purpose is that ring going to make in the rest of this series?

Not to mention… Yuki Kajiura!? It’s awesome to suddenly have an insert-song of her appearing again. It also looks like this is going to be the new ED, which makes it even more interesting.

2010 really has been a major year for A-1 pictures. It’s not exactly their best year (heck, they made Birdy the Mighty in 2009), but I really like how their series have been so experimental this year: they’ve been trying out a ton of different things, not just in Anime no Chikara, but also in Ookiku Furikabutte with its unique direction, and Kuroshitsuji as well. Alois may be insane, but he’s one heck of an interesting character to watch. At this point, I somehow understand why there isn’t going to be an Anime no Chikara in the upcoming fall season, though. My guess is that it has more to do with manpower than with popularity. I mean, how many series are they working on in 2010? 7? (including the long-running Fairy Tail). I’m amazed that they kept up such a good quality for most of them: despite a number of hiccups here and there they all had their own parts in which they’re memorable (Fairy Tail excluded perhaps because I’m not watching that one anymore and Togainu no Chi because it hasn’t aired yet).
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Shiki – 07

by psgels, posted in Shiki



One thing I love about horror series is how consistent they are: once they’ve got an atmosphere built up, they can keep this one going for episodes and episodes. This episode yet again was excellent in the way that it progressed the plot, and this solid atmosphere really helped in bringing up the creepiness factor even though this isn’t really scary. That’s the entire point of Japanese horror: it doesn’t intend to freak you out (that’s also why there are so few anime that are genuinely scary), instead it attempts to captivate its audience with exactly that atmosphere.

This episode focused on three different subplots: an exposition part Masao rising from the dead as a vampire (I knew it!) and receiving the explanation behind the nature of vampires in this series, a build-up part in which Seishin and Toshio prepare to try and catch the vampires, and a character-centric part involving Natsuno teams up with Kaori and Akira, and prepares to dig up Megumi’s grave. The latter was where most of the depth in this episode was, mostly thanks to Kaori. I mean, being forced to dig up the grave of your dead best friend. Who wouldn’t be disturbed? Natsuno in contrast is completely different: he hated Megumi when she was still alive, and he doesn’t really care for others’ feelings, allowing him to take such measures that a lot of others would find insane. Akira meanwhile… is just an idiot. He’s impulsive, but I don’t think that he really realizes what he’s about to do.

As for the exposition, I’m very curious why the creators chose Masao of all guys to show all of this. I mean, I keep feeling like his existence in this series is with a very clear future purpose in mind. He’s weird, what kind of a different vampire is he going to become because of that? There has to be something. Either way though, the vampires in this series are weak against sunlight, they can die when a stake is run through their hearts. And there are very rare vampires who are able to just survive in the middle of sunlight. I’m glad that this series is returning to the roots of vampires, rather than the generic schlock that they have evolved into in the past ten years. But yeah, the irony is that the vampire genre came to evolve the way it did, probably because the classic vampire stories were getting overused at the time.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Secret of Cerulean Sand Review – 82,5/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews




I may be hard on shoujo series at times, but don’t get me wrong: when done right I really love the genre (heck, my favourite series of all time is pretty much a shoujo adventure). Patapata Hikousen no Bouken (otherwise known as the Secret of Cerulean Sand) is a bit childish at times, but it’s a wonderfully charming adventure series that doesn’t shy away from dark topics.

As a story that’s constantly moving forwards, it tells about Jane Buxton and the people she meets as she tries to find her lost brother. While seemingly realistic at first, it quickly shows a number of science fiction roots not unlike Nadia and the Secret of Blue Water. Not surprisingly, since both are based on stories by Jules Verne (a guy who wrote about aeroplanes, decades before they were actually invented). A lot of attention went into creating all kinds of different machines, where this series puts especially its focus on flying machines, but there is a lot more than just that. It’s pretty much the science fiction of 150 years ago. The story also gets pretty epic and fast paced, leaving hardly any time to get bored.

Jane as the lead characters has a ton of charms. She may be a teenager, but she’s smart, knows what she wants, she can think for herself and overall she’s a great character to keep the entire series from flowing smoothly. Among the side characters there’s also quite a bit of character-development throughout the entire series, and I can really only recall two characters whose antics become annoying (a dog and a kid), but even they are not that bad.

While the key animation frames may not look impressive, the in-between animation is where this series really shines. You can spot some repeated frames here and there, but it really is surprisingly smooth and lively at others. The ghibli-esque use of bright colours really makes this a pretty series to look at, despite the seemingly average character-designs. The music is also surprisingly good. Combine this with a solid script and the action scenes are all pretty good throughout the series, ranging from the epic ones to small chases.

You’re going to need a lot of suspense of disbelief, though. It’s entertaining, but this series does remain a children’s adventure. Its main problem is its “children are smarter than adults”-mentality. I mean, I know Jane is smart and all, but when she keeps escaping the bad guys after being captured, time after time, they should have started wondering about how efficient their own security is.

The main bad guy is an interesting one. I mean, he’s as stereotypical as you can get, but the series is aware of it. It knew that it needed a guy like him in order to show the things it wanted to show, and so they did take care in giving him a background, personality and solid motivation… which actually are quite good, and actually result into a surprisingly solid ending. Nowadays, you hardly get to see any new adaptations of classic novels. Which is a pretty darned shame when you see series like this one. It’s not the best, but it has a lot of charms.

Storytelling: 8/10 – If you bring a healthy dose of suspense of disbelief you’ll be rewarded by an exciting adventure whose story just keeps moving and evolving.
Characters: 8/10 – The stereotypical bad guys don’t prevent the charms of the main cast to shine.
Production-Values: 9/10 – Good soundtrack. Smooth animation, surprisingly good for its looks.
Setting: 8/10 – Very neat ideas behind the setting, machines and plot twists. Don’t try to ask the how and why behind it, though. It’s not that solid.

Suggestions:
– Mahou Shoujotai
– Ashita no Nadja

OVA Impressions: Armored Trooper Votoms – Phantom Arc – 03

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



This episode took this OVA in a completely different direction. Seriously, Chirico finally makes his comeback, but the way in which the creators did it. I really have to applaud their guts. There’s no fancy entrance, he’s just there. We still have no bloody idea what he’s doing, other than the fact that he’s running away from what looks like the cult of the Brilliant Heretic, but the scale of this episode was just so small: it was pretty much all about Sophie. Yeah, that woman. I completely forgot about her, but it’s great to see that the creators ended up giving her so much character-development.

I mean, this entire OVA has been chock full of character-development. Especially for anime, how often do you get to see a time-skip of more than thirty years? I really like how Sophie changed over those years: throughout the tv-series, she really seemed possessed by this thirst for revenge, even though she couldn’t do anything about it. Right now she’s just an old woman in her seventies, and apparently, she still remembers the past, but right now she doesn’t really care for this revenge anymore.

Meanwhile, Chirico’s development has been more subtle. He’s still pretty much the same as he’s ever been, though you can really see that he’s grown older. He’s no longer the young boy that he was at the beginning of the TV-series. I think that the biggest difference is that he doesn’t shy away from people anymore: he still doesn’t say much, but he lost the air of “don’t bother me, I want to be alone”.

Overall, when you put everything of Votoms together, you get one heck of a well rounded and varied whole. I mean, no part in this franchise is the same as any of the others, it’s constantly evolving and changing. The Gen-ei hen was again completely different, but at the same time I loved how it also pays homage to the original Votoms series. Heck, this episode even brought back some of the most iconic background tunes that created that bleak atmosphere in the earlier incarnations. I mean, this isn’t even a homage, or a modern version: they took the exact same songs here. That really turned out to be a wonderful way to bring this series back to its roots.

My only complaint about this episode was: how the heck did Vanilla, Goto and the others find Chirico? I mean, they didn’t know about what Chirico did when he was up in that space ship, so in god’s name how did they track this guy down?
OVA Rating: 8,75/10

Rainbow – 20

by psgels, posted in Rainbow



Ah, finally we get the long awaited Cabbage episode. It probably was the funniest episode of Rainbow yet, but that doesn’t really say much since this has probably been the most light-hearted episode so far. Cabbage is just so adorable with his genuine personality. He’s simple, and I guess that that’s why he’s the character with the least amount of depth of the six lead characters, but he definitely has his charms.

This also was an interesting place for this show to explore the yakuza of those days a bit. And thankfully, the yakuza here are well portrayed: they’re neither the stereotypical punks who can only yell, and neither the over the top manly men here. Aside from the guy who randomly burst in with a sword, of course, but that made sense. ^^;

This episode also had a nice anti-climax. It had it coming, but it was still pretty funny how Cabbage explained what happened to him when he stood face to face with that sword. To think that he actually called an ambulance in the middle of a yakuza-building.

Throughout all of the episodes though, there has been one theme that’s been huge, no matter what the series is focusing on: friendship. It sounds cheesy, but when the characters time and time again show how far they’re willing to go to protect this friendship that was build up in their time of jail, it has really worked as a red thread that keeps the different arcs together.

On a side-note: it’s a nice touch that the insert-songs here sound pretty authentic for the time this takes place in. We first had the rock and roll in the Joe arc, but the insert song at the end of this episode also feels part of the fifties and the early sixties. It’s a shame that the OP and ED couldn’t be the same. Although granted, that OP is great in its own way.
Rating: * (Good)