Guin Saga – 05

by psgels, posted in Guin Saga



I’m noticing a worrying decrease in animation quality with every progressive episode of this series, which seriously isn’t a good sign. I really hope hat Satelight are saving their budget for the later episodes, because amidst the beautiful shots the bad shots really stick out like a sore thumb. The graphics of this show unfortunately are of the kind that need a big budget, because otherwise they’re just going to look bad.

In any case, this episode didn’t have me as much impressed as I hoped to. The novelty of this series has worn off just about now and this episode lacked a bit of atmosphere. Guin, Remus and Linda get captured by the Mongol army, only to get rescued again by Istvan. It’s mostly just used as a building up episode, and not really that of an exciting one, although we do learn some new stuff.

As it turns out, these lands are very unfamiliar to the Mongol forces and they too have a lot of trouble trying to fend off all the huge fishes and giant sandworms, which seems to suggest that they don’t have these giant beasts in their home country (otherwise they’d know how to deal with them more efficiently by now). Another small clue was given about Guin and Istvan’s pasts: somehow the name of Landock is important to Guin, which Istvan once saw written on a very fast ship ten years ago when he was being a pirate.

Rating: (Enjoyable)

Full Metal Alchemist – Brotherhood – 05

by psgels, posted in Full Metal Alchemist - Brotherhood



Finally! This is the point I’ve been waiting for, and finally it’s time for me to praise this show a bit. It’s good to see that this time, the annoying part only took up four episodes, rather than FOURTEEN, and not only that but this episode was also significantly better than its original counterpart.

Even though episode 3 didn’t introduce Envy, this episode was sufficient enough for an introduction of the guy. Scar’s appearance also made much more sense this time: he didn’t try to attack an entire army of state alchemists this time, but instead just went after Ed, and made the mistake of thinking that Ed would be easily taken out just like his other victims. The only reason why his face was shown this time was because he didn’t take into account that Ed and Al had metal body-parts, which allowed them to buy enough time for the military to show up (who were also in the neighbourhood).

And in this way, Scar was a much better way of showing Ed how cruel some people can be, compared to that strange butcher who just “happened” to kidnap Winry of all people. Overall, this episode really reminded me why this show has potential. It again was rushed, but things fell much more in their place, aside from the history of Ishbal perhaps, which was a bit too fast. It was nice to see a map of the world though. It gives a much better view of what goes on where. For example, I never knew that Ishbal and Resembool were that close together. And yet in a way this does make sense, as it makes the holiday of Winry’s parents much more plausible.

But what surprised me the most of this episode were the couple of experimental scenes. Especially for BONES, this is really rare: they’re really a studio that focuses on the solidness of their productions (which is quite ironic if you think about how a lot of series of them end up rushed in the end), and I can’t recall any of their series to be experimental, and especially not in the animation and storytelling department. That’s why I loved the sudden appearance of Scar: Ed was in the middle of something completely different, and you really don’t expect the guy to show up at such a moment. The few animations in the beginning also looked really nice.

And as for the bits of comedy amidst the fighting: I like them. The thing is, that the original series was just too emo at times. And with such a series, it’s hard to avoid. That’s why it’s good to see these moments brightening up the mood at times.

The biggest potential pitfall I see for this series is the typical weakness of a Bones’ series: its inability to properly fit its series into the proper time-frame. Out of all of their series I’ve seen (which are quite a few by now), the only show of them whose story fit exactly into its number of episodes was Angelic Layer. Aside from that one, all of the other Bones shows I’ve watched have either rushed endings or in Eureka7’s case 13 consecutive episodes in which nothing really happens, and I really hope that this show is going to be able to avoid it.

Rating: ** (Excellent)

Cross Game – 05

by psgels, posted in Cross Game



The thing that really sets Adachi’s stories apart from all other high school anime is the huge amount of time that he devotes to the history of the lead characters in the beginning, when the characters are still just in middle school and the first few episodes simply set all of the stages for the rest of the series. This is obviously such a good way to flesh out the characters in the beginning. Out of all the shows that started airing this season, I feel like I got to know the cast of Cross Game the best within the time-span of only five episodes. Even the characters of Eden of the East are nowhere as likable as these guys.

This episode was even more slice of life than usual for this series, but what a wonderful episode it was. Basically, both Aoba’s father and big sister and Kou’s parents were out of town while Momiji wasn’t feeling well. Kou was asked to keep a bit of an eye on Momiji alongside Aoba. So after Kou’s usual secret training sessions, he visits the local supermarket and brings back food for the three of him, Aoba and Momiji.

Since Aoba never really learned how to cook with sisters as Wakaba and Ichijou, Kou offers to cook dinner, even though Aoba is obviously heavily against it. Also here it shows how Wakaba is still on these youngsters’ minds: the moment Aoba goes too far in her insults the whole mood completely changes even though the reason for it is never explicitly mentioned.

What’s more, this episode also was about a cooking book that Wakaba used to use. Aoba originally intended to use it, but she accidentally lets Kou find it. The result is a bowl of rice that tastes exactly the same as Wakaba used to make it, which is especially tough on Aoba.

Then there’s Momiji’s fever in this episode, which is also used in order to show the downsides of Aoba’s tomboyish character: when she starts feeling unwell, it’s mostly Kou who keeps everything in straight lines and makes sure Momiji’s fever goes down fast. Aoba just thinks too much of Aoba, who really was the type of caring sister (especially since she thinks back on how Wakaba used to take care of her when she herself was ill). It’s the same trick that Touch used, though slightly different: Kazuya was simply better than Tatsuya in every aspect, while Aoba still had sports in which she could stand above her sister.

And on a side-note: I really like Momiji’s character, and how well she and Kou get along with each other. Momiji feels really genuine as a character, and there’s something wonderfully innocent about how she and Kou interact. Of course, the chemistry between a lot of different characters in this series is really good, but the two of them really take the cake in my opinion.

Rating: ** (Excellent)

Valkyria Chronicles – 05

by psgels, posted in Valkyria Chronicles



This series is strange. On one hand it’s about two warring countries, but on the other hand it has pigs with wings. Seriously, as much as I appreciate that Alicia is very alert for possible spies, this needs to end somewhere. While seeing Welkim as some spy was at least a bit believable… but that pig? I mean, come on.

But still, I’m starting to see where the creators are trying to go with this series. They’re really trying to go with the contrast between the light and innocent Alicia when she’s not fighting and the ambitious woman that she turns into when the fighting actually starts. As innocent as she may look, as annoying as she may be at times with all her complaining against Welkim and Faldio, she did go through military training and it shows that she knows how to handle herself in a combat situation. She just lacks experience. And that’s why the character-development in this series is going to be so important.

Because this particular formula of having young girls fight in war has been abused plenty of times throughout anime. Just think of the countless shounen series that have teenagers fighting against hordes of formidable and trained bad guys. For this series, it’s all going to depend on the execution if the creators want to avoid this pitfall, and I must say that the start so far has been pretty solid. The realism definitely helps: when Alicia got shot in this episode, I definitely cared about her and I’m really suspecting that this is going to be a series in which people die when they’re killed.

Alicia is definitely a character that you need to warm up to. I hope that that happens fast, though. This episode was pretty good, but some of her banter with Faldio was just annoying.

Now, let me hijack the rest of this post for something completely different: I was quite surprised to see that many people who found the episode ratings helpful. I decided to remove them mainly because it was getting really tedious to write a short episode synopsis every time, so that one isn’t going to come back.

This is also a good opportunity to change the episode rating system a bit. The numbers out of ten were nice and all, but they had a few bad points: they were in the same format that I used for the monthly summaries, and yet meant something completely different, and I just kept rating about 90% of all episodes as 7,5/10 or 8/10. What I also didn’t like was how they were always at the top of every post, possibly taking away some attention from the more important parts, which is why I think that from now on, the ratings are going to move to the bottom of the post.

I think I’m also going to swap the x/10-format with simple stars (or some other symbol). Though instead of simply mapping the out of ten-ratings to five stars like 6/10 = 3 stars, 8/10 = 4 stars, et cetera, I’m going for something a bit different. Compare it to the star-rating for hotels and restaurants: an episode has to earn its stars. So, the rating scale would be something like this:
(no stars) – probably going to be denoted by a simple ‘-‘. Basically an episode that left me unimpressed.
* (one star) – The equivalent of my current 7,5/10 rating: a pretty good episode
** (two stars) – The equivalent of my current 8/10 rating: excellent episode
*** (three stars) – The equivalent of my current 8,5/10 rating: an awesome episode.
**** – (four stars) – The equivalent of my current 9/10 rating: a fantastic episode which really shows the episode at its utter best
***** – (five stars) – The equivalent of my current 9,5/10 rating: an incredible episode, the best of the best, and probably an episode that only appears once or twice a year or so.
In theory, there also can be six stars, but in all the three and a half years I’ve been blogging I only encountered one episode that deserved such a rating (Simounr 16, to be exact).

In any case, for this episode, the rating would be something like this:

Episode Rating: *

Phantom – 05

by psgels, posted in Phantom


Oh, this series is sure shaping up to be an awesome one. I had a few doubts as this episode started that it wouldn’t live up to the other episodes of this show so far, but as the ending credits rolled I really had to this back: this episode knew exactly what it was doing.

I really like the approach when it comes to the random stories of this series: at first, it shows the people from the Mafia from a sympathetic sight. It shows that even though these guys are thugs and don’t hesitate to kill if they want, they are also human beings with a family… only for them to get killed off mercilessly by Phantom in the end. El Cazador in comparison was much more of a travel series, in which the lead characters move around and meet different people, while the early episodes of Noir were more about why the targets were ordered to be killed in the first place, since the two lead characters were freelance assassins, rather than being employed by one particular mafia-gang like the lead characters of Phantom are. I can’t comment on how Madlax did it since I haven’t seen it yet.

Throughout the largest part of the episode, it felt like the parts were swapped, and the mafia boss instead was the lead character of this episode. Eins and Zwei really were portrayed as the bad guys this time, and that‘s something you don’t see very often. And at the same time we also get a pretty good idea of how powerful Inferno actually is: even without Phantom, they have excellent security, and prevent any information about them from being leaked out in order to stay into obscurity.

It’s also interesting how Ein and Zwei are basically mirroring each other at some points. Ein has that strange scientist while Zwei has McCunnen, and with both we see at least some hints that whenever one of them is with them, the other one is waiting for them. Just how they exactly feel about each other still is a mystery, though.

Pandora Hearts – 05

by psgels, posted in Pandora Hearts



In this episode, we get some more clues as to what exactly happens when a monster from the abyss makes a contract with a human. It’s basically a method for both of them to get out of the Abyss, but it’s not going to last forever: at one point both of them will be dragged back into the Abyss. And at the same time, there was quite a bit of banter between the characters out there. While it’s not quite the funniest banter out there, Oz calling Raven “father” was priceless.

It was mostly a building up episode, but still it made a lot of impact and at the same time this episode also used its time to flesh out the characters quite a bit and increase the trust between the lead characters. It’s of course strange that Oz would simply trust someone he just met (as signified by this episode in which a seemingly innocent flower-selling girl turns out to be possessed by a demon), but then again: there’s nobody else that he can trust, is there? Alice was Oz’s ticket out of the Abyss, and I think that that’s why he’s not suspicious of her, and I think that that’s why he was more shocked at seeing the flower-girl disappear, compared to the thought that he himself would also return to the abyss that way unless a countermeasure is found.

Still, the animation this episode was strange. Throughout most of the episode, it looked as good as ever… apart from that flower-girl whose face looked horribly distorted at times. Usually a bad drawing can just be attributed to either a limited budget or an incompetent chief animation director, but why do only the drawings for that girl look ugly? My guess would be that there was just one guy responsible for drawing her, and he screwed up big time.

Eden of the East – 04

by psgels, posted in Eden of the East



I just realized that Akira and Saki have quite a few similarities as the two lead characters of this show. They’re both at the turning point in their lives and both have to deal with the rather annoying consequences of it. Saki has finally finished her education and is about to get ready for a job, while Akira is someone who seems to have cast his old self away and wanted to start anew, or so it seems at least.

In any case, this episode sheds some light into the purpose of the Selecao and the role of the supporter. Quite early, actually. It indeed turns out that the Selecao are in a game to see who can save the nation first. Accepting such a phone is pretty much a guaranteed death, because if you aren’t the fastest, you’re going to get killed off anyway, and I think that that was the intention of number one when he tried to get rid of Akira: he knew that with such a ‘special’ personality, if anyone would be able to save he nation, it would be him.

The thing is that up till now, all we’ve seen is extremes: ignoring the mysterious number one who appeared only for a flash, we have one incredibly strange Selecao (Akira), we have someone who tried to save the nation, and failed horribly and so started using his money for his personal gain (Kondou), and we have someone who has no problems with dying and just wants to do what he can with his money. I really doubt that the other Selecao are just as extreme as these guys, and they probably all are somewhere in between the latter two (aside from the Supporter, perhaps). I’m especially intrigued that nobody aside from Kondou has tried to abuse his money for his personal gain.

As I’m watching this series, I realize how little anime deal with actualities. I mean, I of course understand that series usually are planned years ahead, and if they’re based on a manga even more, but still even the events of 9/11 are only mentioned or referenced in a very select amount of series. In most ‘modern’ series, the PCs are still stuck in Windows 95. Cameras still look like the models of 10 years ago. And in a way that’s a shame, because keeping up with actualities is a very good way for anime to remain fresh. And that’s why Eden of the East feels so fresh, in these financially difficult times the theme of how difficult it is to save a country is very up to date. In fact, it’s so up to date that it’s almost scary, since I doubt that this series was only planned and produced within the eight months since the recession started.

Basquash! – 05

by psgels, posted in Basquash!


If you’re wondering what happened to the synopsis and episode rating at the beginning of each post: I decided to remove it. It was beginning to get tedious again to every time write up some spoiler-free synopsis and the episode ratings didn’t really have lots of meaning: I was too busy labelling those episodes in different categories rather than paying attention to what was really going on. I’ll probably still do these blurbs in my quick first impressions at the beginning of each season, but to do this for every single episode has become quite redundant. If I loved an episode, it’s much easier for me to just write it in the actual post.

In any case, I’m glad that I ended up blogging Basquash!, because this show seriously is only getting better and better. It knows exactly when it needs to be silly and when to be serious. In this episode, we see the first real match of Dan, Sera and Iceman against another mecha-basketball team, and it’s just as I hoped: while a big focus of this series is show is basketball, there’s much more going on than just that. It just keeps the baseball tactics for what they are, and instead focuses on the audience: what moves a crowd and how to make optimal use of it.

This episode again showed how distant Dan and Coco actually are from each other. Because Dan has been busy with Haruka he has been forced to live along with Miyuki and the others, but this hasn’t closed the gap between them at all. You’d think that the two of them need a bit f time on their own, but Dan never bothers to try and understand, and Coco just refuses to give him the opportunity to do so. I don’t think that she specifically hates him for what happened to her legs, but I think it’s a combination between a typical brother-sister relationship and how she’s jealous of him, having legs and still being able to have fun with his friends.

And despite that huge bosom of hers, I’m surprised at how much I like Haruka. She definitely adds some spice to this show with her ambitious plans to promote her shoe designs through basketball, not to mention that this episode shows how she’s a control freak: she likes to be totally in charge, and when things don’t go according to how she wants it, she really gets poisonous.

And at the same time, this show isn’t afraid to remind everyone that this is just supposed to be a fun show. I’ve never heard of a mecha that can be controlled by basketballs out of all things, and you just have to love how that guy on the moon, despite looking like either a mid-boss or the final bad guy, is blowing soap bubbles like it’s the most normal thing to do. ^^;

April Summary

by psgels, posted in Monthly Summaries

I think that this is the first time that this ever happened ever since I started including ratings in these summaries: none of the shows I’m watching has a rating of 9/10 or above. But that’s logical since the only awesome show that continued from the past month was Hajime no Ippo, and that one had a lesser month this time. In any case, this is really typical of this season: there are no instant classics yet, but there sure are a hell of a lot with the potential to become one.

Oh, and another thing: I ended up experimenting with the rankings again. The result is that some shows with higher ratings may be ranked lower than you’d expect and vice versa. This time, I basically tried to generate the rankings for each show, compared to the others that are currently airing. Say, for example that Show A has a really good setting, and there are only a few other shows with a better setting, it’s going to rank higher than if there are many shows with excellent settings, and vice versa. Please don’t ask me in what kind of mindset I was when I thought of this system.

#41 (new) – Gokujou!! Mecha Motte Iinchou – (2/10) – The honour of ‘worst show of the season’ goes to this… thing. Congrats. I never imagined that something would end up beating Queen’s Blade in this category. Dropped.
#40 (new) – Queen’s Blade – (3,25/10) – One thing I don’t get about these series: why aren’t they just turned into a hentai-series? I mean, you get a lot more nudity that way and the show doesn’t have to pretend to have a plot or anything. In any case, this one’s obviously dropped.
#39 (new) – Cookin’ Idol Ai! Mai! Main! – (3,75/10) – In this series, the impossible happened: Hiroshi Watanabe surpassed himself. The cabbage song combined with the utterly bad acting were already bizarre, but when I looked at the staff list, everything suddenly made sense. When I thought that he couldn’t sink any lower than Shining Tears X Wind, this guy proves me wrong once again. Dropped.
#38 (new) – Metal Fight Beyblade – (6,5/10) – Stupid shounen stuff of which I don’t even remember what it was about. Dropped obviously.
#37 (new) – Hanasakeru Seishonen – (6,75/10) – The best way to describe this show is a teenaged soap gone anime. Seriously, the incredible stupidity of the bits that I saw before dropping this show are nearly unbelievable. Characters have really dull and overemotional personalities. Dropped.
#36 (new) – Jewel Pets – (7/10) – Ever since Otogi Juushi Akazukin and Power Puff Z I’ve been looking for those really charming and childish kiddie shows. The only problem is that the good ones are really hard to find! I was hoping that Jewel Pets would finally return some spark to a genre that virtually burnt out now, but alas; it showed its true colours soon enough: all of the characters lose their personality completely after their introduction episodes and become mere paper bags. Dropped.
#35 (new) – Tayutama ~Kiss on my Deity~ – (7/10) – That first episode had its enjoyable moments, but there is no way that I’m going to continue with this series. It just feels too much like your standard average harem. Dropped.
#34 (new) – Slap Up Party ~Arad Senki~ – (7/10) – While I appreciate the idea of an international production between Japan and Korea, there’s no denial that the writing in this show sucks. While usually Gonzo’s game adaptations have some surprise in them, Slap Up Party only consists out of a bunch of clichés struck together, and the humour really quickly gets dull. Dropped.
#33 (new) – Dragonball Kai – (7,5/10) – I sat through 270 episodes one time already, and I don’t want to do the same, even though everything’s shortened. This really is the series for those who are new to the franchise. Dropped.
#32 (new) – Hatsukoi Limited – (7,5/10) – In the end, I figured that the lead girls seemed a little too much like copy-pasted moeblobs and I don’t feel like sitting through this series to find out whether I was wrong when there are many other better comedies this season.
#31 (new) – Higepiyo – (7,5/10) – Ooh, this isn’t looking good. While it had the nice premise and the first two episodes were hilarious, it’s quickly getting dull because the creators keep overusing the food jokes. Bring in some novelty, please!
#30 (new) – Charady no Joke na Mainichi – (7,5/10) – I tried to follow this for a while, but in the end it’s just not worth the trouble of having to sit through the episode, not knowing when a joke falls flat or becomes hilarious. Out of the first fourteen episodes I watched, only two really made me laugh, and there are much better comedies this season. Dropped
#29 (30) – Shinkyoku Soukai Polyphonica – (7,5/10) – I pretty much agree with the general consensus of this remake: it’s definitely better than the original, but still not really worth it to watch all the way through the end. Dropped.
#28 (new) – Asura Cryin’ – (7,5/10) – There is potential, but the characters are too annoying for me to want to check whether the show can realize it. Dropped.
#27 (new) – Tears to Tiara – (7,5/10) – I’m not that interested in the next Utawarerumono. There’s much better stuff this season, so I ended up dropping this series.
#26 (36) – Hayate no Gotoku – (7,75/10) – It’s unfortunate that I can’t watch every show that airs. I know that I never really gave this series a proper chance, but at the same time there are too many other shows this season that I also want to watch. Dropped.
#25 (new) – Saki – (7,75/10) – The big problem with Saki is that I’m not yet convinced of Saki’s talent. Take Shion no Ou, for example: even though the rules of Shougi were unclear to many, you could see that Shion was pwn. Saki instead is a character who could perform a Russian Roulette eighteen times and still come out alive. Still: the characters are enjoyable to watch and because of that I haven’t dropped this series yet. But seriously, there need to be less episodes of the kind of episode four. A bit of moe is of course fine, but that was really stretching it.
#24 (new) – Souten Kouro – (7,5/10) – Madhouse’s only new show this season, and quite frankly it’s a disappointment. I’ve never been interested in the whole romance of the three kingdoms setting, and this show again doesn’t seem to convince me otherwise. Dropped
#23 (new) – K-On – (7,75/10) – Obviously, this isn’t my kind of series. I still don’t understand why the heck everyone’s drooling over Mio. For me, the characters were just way too annoying. Dropped.
#22 (23) – Gintama – (7,75/10) – Granted, it still in no way lives up to the first 100 episodes, but the new director at least is competent when he gets to the serious parts, and I have to agree that episode 108 was pretty good.
#21 (new) – Full Metal Alchemist – Brotherhood – (7,75/10) – The new Full Metal Alchemist isn’t perfect. Especially its idea of cropping two chapters in one episode leads to rushed episodes. But on the bright side, Ed and Al are a hell of a lot more likable than in the original series, and that has definitely potential for the future of this series.
#20 (17) – Koukaku no Regios – (8/10) – I can’t really say that Regios is getting better, but neither is it getting worse. It still has nice characters with a competent plot in an interesting setting, but as usual, nothing really stands out.
#19 (18) – Chi’s New Address – (8,25/10) – The first four episodes were a bit too serious for their own good, but after that Chi’s Sweet Home really became just as good as the first season, if not better. Especially the rate of dull episodes seems much smaller now.
#18 (new) – Valkyria Chronicles – (7,75/10) – While this show is nothing special yet, there looks to be potential for its second half. The lighter moments, especially those involving Alicia, are a bit annoying, but once the tank combat starts the show gets much better. Now let’s see whether the creators can pull this show off.
#17 (new) – Shangri-La – (8/10) – The character animation is incredibly inconsistent, yeah. Thankfully the rest of the series has enough potential to make up for it. Shangri-La at the moment is nothing special yet, but I’m intrigued by the setting, the cast is likable and you can see that it’s really using the beginning episodes to build up for something. This show can really go anywhere, but for now I’ll remain positive.
#16 (new) – Shin Mazinger Shougenki! Z-Hen – (8,25/10) – You can really count on the creator of Giant Robo to make a remake of the Mazinger series awesome. And oh, the irony: all of the giant robots of the good guys have proven to be absolutely useless so far, and instead the best action happens between the spectators. A very nice touch if I say so myself. I’m definitely going to enjoy this series.
#15 (7) – Hajime no Ippo – (8,25/10) – Just about my only complaint of Hajime no Ippo is that it suffers from the Dragonball Z syndrome. With that, I don’t mean that it has the ability to stretch five minutes into five days, but rather that once formidable side-characters become absolutely useless as soon as the lead character level up much faster than them. This month was relatively weak for this series: it was still fun (with some hilarious facial expressions), but nowhere up to the level of the first half.
#14 (new) – 07-Ghost – (8/10) – This one has been quite the solid series so far. So yeah, there are some shounen ai undertones here and there, but it’s nothing that should really distract you from viewing unless you’re a complete and utter homophobe. The characters are quite likable and it’s got lots of potential for the future.
#13 (new) – Sengoku Basara – (8,25/10) – I know I talked down on this series in my first impressions, but it looks like I’m going to have to take back those comments. Sengoku Basara is GAR, manly, exciting and has some amazing action scenes. Once you start to get the back-story a bit, the whole thing suddenly becomes much more interesting.
#12 (new) – Marie & Gali – (8,25/10) – Call me crazy, but I’m enjoying this little show. It’s fun to see especially Marie’s antics, but also all of the weird stuff and cameos that goes on, along with this show’s unique style and episodes of only five minutes proved to be quite entertaining.
#11 (19) – Kurokami the Animation – (8,25/10) – Woo! I’m glad that my prediction with this series was right: during the past month, Kurokami became significantly better when compared to the rather lacklustre first half. Now that the storyline’s evolving there are lots of nice and juicy plot twists that are actually pretty interesting to watch. Now let’s hope that the show can keep this up.

#10 (14) – Hetalia Axis Powers – (8,5/10)

Episode 14 was absolutely brilliant. It’s a really good thing to see that this series is just getting better and better. The inclusion of the rest of the cast has really been good for this show. Although I do have to say that Hetalia is at its best when it makes fun of country stereotypes, and at its worst when it’s overusing gay jokes.

#9 (new) – Konnichiwa Anne – (8,25/10)

I was a bit fearful that this series might end up a bit too dramatic, but so far there turns out to be no reason for those worries. Anne is shaping up to be an awesome character, and she especially shines when she dives off into that own world of her.

#8 (new) – Basquash! – (8,25/10)

Some of the jokes used are… immature to say the least, and yet I still find myself enjoying this series quite a lot. It’s got a great sense of fun and the chemistry of the characters is working out surprisingly well.

#7 (new) – Ristorante Paradiso – (8,25/10)

Rispara has definitely been an interesting series so far, and I especially like the detailed and fleshed out characters that stood apart right from the beginning. David Production made a good debut with this show.

#6 (new) – Natsu no Arashi – (8,5/10)

The most underrated show this season. I may have dropped this show from blogging, but that in no way means that I don’t like it. It’s good to see Shinbo finally handling a series with actually good characters. This show has some wonderful slice of life scenes, and yet at the same time there’s this theme of past versus present that keeps everything together. Also, am I the only one who likes the male lead? Sure, he takes some time getting used to, but I find him quite enjoyable.

#5 (new) – Guin Saga – (8,5/10)

Classic fantasy, and for once it’s done absolutely right. The pacing is really slow, but it’s the type of show that really easily draws you in. Just about everything in this series is big, ranging from the locations, characters, the soundtrack or the setting.

#4 (new) – Phantom – (8,75/10)

It may not be that different from Bee-Train’s usual series, but I’m biased so I don’t care. Besides, with such an excellent source material, this series is promising to be one of the top Bee-Train series. Already after four episodes we can see the awesome characterization that certainly proves lots of great stuff for the future.

#3 (new) – Pandora Hearts – (8,75/10)

I really like this series so far. The whole atmosphere that seems like a modern-day fairy tale gone really dark continuously has something interesting to offer. As a big fan of mystery-series, I really like how it just keeps bringing in new questions after answering a few. The storytelling has been really solid so far, and I actually quite like the very distinct look of the graphics. Definitely something to look out for.

#2 (new) – Cross Game – (8,75/10)

Do not get fooled by the simple character-designs, because this show really stands out as one of the best of the season so far. Already after four episodes, the show has a cast of characters in which nearly all of them (including the tiny side characters) have presence. It’s got a very subtle sense of humour, combined with great slice of life and just the right amount of drama. Definitely one of my top picks of the season.

#1 (new) – Eden of the East – (8,75/10)

Yeah, this series is really good stuff. The production values are really high and the episodes thus far have been incredibly intriguing. I can’t wait to see the rest of this thing!

07-Ghost – 04

by psgels, posted in 07-Ghost



Short Synopsis: The old guy goes after Teito as Mikage faces the decision between Teito and his family.
Episode Rating: 7,5/10 (Good)
So, this is where the shounen-ai elements pop up, with Mikage and Teito wanting to see each other that badly, up to the point where Mikage chooses protecting Teito over his family. But really, the relationship between the two of them isn’t that bad, and it doesn’t get in the way of what’s really important in this show at all.

It overall was still a pretty good episode, especially with all of the stuff surrounding the old guy, who turns out to be a ghoul. The fight against him was really well written: it had impact, and at the same time there were lots of things going on. I’m interested to see what role the Ghouls will have in the rest of the series: with such a considerable amount of time devoted to them, there has to be some link between them and Ayanami.

And that mermaid… I’m not exactly sure what to think of her since her introduction was pretty strange. All we know is that she has two different forms (probably one under water and one for out of water), she likes Teito but hates Frau. That probably is a subtle hint for at least something, but I can’t exactly put my finger onto what.