Hoshi no Umi no Amuri

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews



Well, I finally made myself watch the final episode of this thing. Hoshi no Umi no Amuri, or Amuri in the Star Ocean, is a three episode OVA, fully rendered in 3D CG. What I expected when I started watching was another one of those bad and uninspired fanservice OVAs, without any redeeming value whatsoever. What I got was… well, I’m still not sure what I got exactly, but it was really weird.

Seriously, this entire OVA feels like a really bad acid trip in space. Try to imagine yourself drunk, stoned, in an airless environment and having just lost a significant amount of blood. The hallucinations you can get there are a pretty accurate portrayal of all the bizarre stuff that flies, bounces, blasts and jumps across the screen in this OVA. It really is surreal beyond belief.

But the thing is, that it’s got a cast of really charming characters somehow. The characters in this series have lots of really weird powers, but they all have to do with escapism: the lead characters bounces off everywhere, but this is because she keeps resisting against making contact and friends with other people. Another character constantly flies uncontrollably across the screen like an annoying fly, but that’s because she’s constantly running away from trouble.

Overall, I refuse to give this series a rating, because my rating system just isn’t fit for all the strange stuff that happens in this series. I liked the show, though. It definitely isn’t for everyone, especially those who hate extremely sugary and energetic series will hate this show with passion, but if you’re looking for something utterly bizarre yet charming, then this series is a must-watch.

Tsubasa Shunraiki – 01

by psgels, posted in Tsubasa Chronicle, Tsubasa Shunraiki



Short Synopsis: The party returns to Kurogane’s homeland
Episode Rating: 6/10 (Disappointing)
Wait, wut? Did I miss something here? Did some sort of extra OVA get released half a year ago without me knowing anything about it or something? What the heck happened here… when the episode started airing, the characters were suddenly surrounded by Fye’s magic for God knows what kind of reason, Kurogane chops off his own arm from out of nowhere, they then somehow end up in Kurogane’s home country and Fye starts having flashbacks of things that never actually happened…

My best guess would be that the makers of the anime decided to screw the continuity and just went animating a random chapter that coincides with the current xxxHolic Shunmuki OVA. With the OVA format, it’s of course much easier to make the cross-overs between the two, but that’s no excuse for simply omitting an entire storyline here. I was really looking forward to seeing Fye meet the guy who was out to kill him, and here they just unceremoniously kill the guy off in a bunch of mere seconds.

So yeah, Tsubasa Chronicle is a complete mess in terms of continuity. Right now, it’s clear that Bee-Train wanted to go for its own storyline. While the second season may have been seen as a bunch of fillers, it was clearly building up to something that wasn’t in the manga’s continuity. My guess is that they knew that the manga wouldn’t have ended at the end of the third season, so they went with their own direction, which might have been a success or a complete flop, we’ll never know. In any case, Clamp didn’t like others messing with their storyline and wanted a faithful adaptation, so they turned to Production IG, who also made the xxxHolic TV-series. It’s of course understandable that they’d have to pick up at the last point where Bee-Train did follow through the manga, but I really hate how they basically went “screw the people who have only seen the anime, we’re here for the manga fans”. This mighty be an awesome episode for those who read the manga, but since I’ve never read it, I just find it lazy.

This episode did have plenty of interesting stuff, though. While the animation wasn’t as good as Tokyo Revelations, the xxxHolic crossovers were definitely interesting to see. My only fear with this is the role that Watanuki is going to play in it. Every character in Tsubasa Chronicle seems to be a superhuman fighting machine without any sense of pain (look at Kurogane cutting off his own arm without even flinching, or nobody being freaked out or startled by it, or how Syaoran got impaled multiple times through the heart and chest but seems to be completely fine), so I wonder what Watanuki really can do with all these superhumans around him without becoming a superhuman himself.

Natsume Yuujin-Chou – 24

by psgels, posted in Natsume Yuujin-Chou



Short Synopsis: Natori returns and needs Natsume’s powers once again.
Episode Rating: 7,5/10 (Good)
Okay, so while this series hasn’t been my favourite of the past season, I’d love to see a third season introduced one of these days. The second season was also announced around this time in the first season, so let’s hope that the creators aren’t planning to end this just yet with only 26 episodes. There’s lots of potential left in this one, although on the other hand, it’s also going to be interesting to see what Brains Base can do when they start working on a completely new and different series. It’s a shame that these small yet very good companies as Brains Base, Manglobe and Bee-Train (well, at least I consider them very good) can only release one or two series every year, because it’s always interesting to see what they can come up with next.

One thing I didn’t like in this episode was how Natsume turns out to have huge mysterious powers. I’d hoped that this series would avoid this cliche, but I guess that it’s going to be important for later story arcs, if they ever get to be animated. The subject of this episode was an interesting one, though. Natsume finally gets the chance to attend a sort-of “people who can see youkai”-convention. In this, he hopes to see other people who are the same as him, but that really was the wrong kind of place he should have tried to look for.

Most of the people in the convention were simply looking for business, and came from close-knit families in which it was normal to see and use youkai. It really seems that seeing Youkai runs down your family. These families have mostly strong values of traditions, and so their values are easily passed down from generation to generation, without much influence from outsiders who can’t see them. It actually turns out that Natsume is a minority in his suffering because he grew up alone, thanks to Reiko who most likely never wanted to have to do anything with those pesky family values, despite having huge powers. My guess would be that she was the daughter of a powerful and influential family of people who can see youkai, which fell apart at some point.

The final two episodes seem to belong to a big arc, which finally does resemble a real climax, rather than the unconventional yet anticlimactic ending of the first season. Let’s hope that the creators do succeed in combining three chapters in only two episodes, but a bit of a clever cut-job should be able to do it.

Casshern Sins Review – 90/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews, Casshern Sins


One of the most unique series to start airing in the past Fall Season was Casshern Sins: a remake of a super robot series that aired in the seventies, but one that went into a completely different direction with just about everything. The result is a highly stylish series with lots and lots of things to like about it.

If there ever was an award for “Best Character-Designs”, then this series would be one of the top contenders. The art style in this series is really unique, and in fact it’s one of the most outstanding ones I’ve seen in the past few years. Just about everything in this series is a visual feast, ranging from the wonderfully drawn characters to the astonishingly beautiful background art. The animation quality itself isn’t anything special for most of the time, but it doesn’t need to be: this series is beautiful enough, even without a huge budget.

This series also stands out in its style of storytelling. The dialogue flows very naturally, and yet it’s deep, meaningful and very inspired without trying to sound pretentious. The pacing is deliberately kept slow in order to squeeze all of the potential out of the characters. It really was my favourite part of this series, because the dialogue flows in this series unlike any other series I’ve seen.

Casshern sins is a series about destruction and immortality, and a quite thought-provoking one as well. while mystery isn’t its main focus, it asks lots of interesting questions throughout its airtime that keep the viewer busy. As the lot unravels more and more, it really is the type of plot that requires the user to think in order to understand it all, because not everything is spoon-fed on a silver platter.

However, do note that this isn’t a series that only gets better and better. It’s divided into two halves: the first half is basically a travelling series, where the main character meets lots of different people. The quality is pretty inconsistent: some of the best and worst episodes of the series can be found here. In the second half, the main story kicks in, and the series becomes much more consistent: it pretty much continues at a steady pace, it never hits any lows, but also any heights are absent. This can become disappointing if you were hyped by some of the truly outstanding episodes in the first half. It’s the sign that the charcter-development never really came together in the end, although it definitely tried.

The only other flaw of this series is a rushed ending, though. The creators just didn’t take enough time for that final episodes, and the twists just come too fast to make the impact they could have had. But still we have ourselves an excellent series here. It’s fresh, original and imaginative despite based on a 1970s series. It doesn’t quite have the material to become an outstanding series, but it nevertheless has been a delightful watch for me for the past six months.

Storytelling: 9/10
Characters: 8/10
Production-Values: 10/10
Setting: 9/10

Casshern Sins – 24

by psgels, posted in Casshern Sins



Short Synopsis: The finale of Casshern Sins.
Episode Rating: 7,5/10 (Good)
Yeah, like expected: the creators tried to stuff too much into this episode and therefore it lacked the impact it could have had, but let me tell you this: if the right time was reserved to make everything in this episode give enough time to naturally unfold, this ending would have rocked beyond belief, and it would have been a great candidate for the best ending of the year. There were so many nice ideas in this episode, so it’s a bloody shame that the creators couldn’t have gotten their hands on one extra episode.

the big problem here that Casshern Sins has always been at its best in slow pacings: letting the dialogue slowly and fluently carry what’s happening. In this episode Lyuze and Ouji die within five minutes. That’s way too little. I could fully imagine that the material in this episode would have been more than enough to make four episodes of awesomeness: one about Lyuze and Ouji’s death, one about Casshern vs. Braiking Boss, one about Casshern vs. Luna and one aftermath in which we see Ringo grow up. The creators would have been easily able to fill that time within the episode.

But still I loved this episode, even though it could have been so much better. The thing I loved most about this episode was the final scene, in which we see Ringo grow up alone along with Friender. We never get confirmed whether she really is Leda’s child, but things are pretty certain here. Normally robots don’t grow, but she did, and she’s a teen-aged girl at the end of the episode. The only reason she could have grown into that was because she’s like Casshern, Dio and Leda. I appreciate it though, that the creators didn’t hang a sign over her with “look at me, I’m Leda’s daughter!!!”.

But yeah, what ever happened to that coloured rock?

In any case, it’s definitely been interesting to blog this series. In the end, it’s never really been my favourite series, but it sure as hell came close. My top 3 of the shows that started airing in the past fall season at the moment is the following:
#3: Clannad
#1/2: Mouryou no Hako, Michiko e Hatchin
I’m still not sure about the exact order between number 1 and 2, but I don’t think that I can include Casshern in it. It just… missed that extra something that would make it truly outstanding, and that I did experience in Clannad, Michiko e Hatchin and Mouryou no Hako. Nevertheless, it’s been an excellent series, with some of the most beautiful visuals out there.

Mobile Suit Gundam 00 – 48

by psgels, posted in Mobile Suit Gundam 00



Short Synopsis: It has arrived: the huge space fortress.
Episode Rating: 7,5/10 (Good)
I’m pretty surprised: while it hasn’t been anything amazing, the past few episodes have been pretty solid action. I was expecting the show to completely fall apart at this point… and it didn’t. Thumbs up for the creators. I’m never going to label this series among my favourites, but it’s still good to see that this ended up being such an enjoyable series.

So yeah, obviously Ribbons didn’t die. This really was the episode in which all hell breaks loose, and the body count was significantly increased: Regetta dies, Patrick dies for a second time, and Marie is also now potentially dead, though since we never actually saw her die, this means that she’s still going to appear in the next episodes. There’s still this matter of Allelujah vs. Hallelujah that needs to be taken care of, of course.

And yeah, of course I should have known that the big space fortress of this Gundam would be Veda: Ribbons’ headquarters. The army of clones was a bit too much, though. Especially since most of them seemed literally to have the intelligence of a bunch of flies more than anything. The biggest danger of these huge overwhelming numbers is of course the potential for power-level inconsistencies. Ribbons has been portrayed so much as the evil overlord that he seems nearly invincible at this point. But then again, he does have one weak point: when Veda’s gone, he’ll be screwed. It’s of course the perfect source of a grand climax: an exploding huge space fortress. Now all that’s left is to see how they’re going to do that. It’d be pretty anticlimactic if Setsuna would just barge in, hit the self-destruct button and flee outside again.

White Album – 11

by psgels, posted in White Album



Short Synopsis: Preparations for the upcoming concerts commence.
Episode Rating: 7/10 (Enjoyable)
AlexS has a very good point here: the characters here don’t behave like they are in 1986, they behave like modern day characters who have somehow lost their mobile phones and computers. Interestingly enough, answering machines were already invented and on the market in 1986, so why aren’t they used here? Having an huge focus on realism is a double-edged sword: on one side it’s awesome, and really allows the characters to shine, but the flaws become much more noticeable this way, and that’s what currently is happening with White Album.

Because it’s seriously getting harder and harder for me to like this series. I really want to be a fan of this series and its subtle execution, but these melodramatic scenes are getting harder and harder to take seriously. When I started this series, I guess I was hoping for a sort-of more dramatic version of Natsu no Sora, and the drama has really been excellent when it just involved characters talking to each other, but hwen they started crying and whining, I just couldn’t take them seriously.

The one crying in this episode was Touya, and this was really the most pathetic scene of the entire series. Idiot, if you want to see Yuki so badly, then go look her up! You’re daily making out with her manager, for god’s sake. Couldn’t he at least have asked her when she has a small break in her schedule? Besides, after all his flirting with Rina, Yayoi and Misaki, I’m surprised that he’s still genuinely missing Yuki.

But yeah, i guess that these characters are really meant to be hated. I’m going to wait until episode 13 before really labelling this show as overambitious, but that midway climax had better be damn good.

Birdy the Mighty Decode – 23

by psgels, posted in Birdy the Mighty Decode



Short Synopsis: Birdy starts to search for Natoru.
Episode Rating: 8,5/10 (Awesome)
And so this series continues its string of utterly incredible episodes. Oh boy, it sure has set a incredibly high standard for the rest of 2009. It’s going to be interesting whether the rest of the year can produce another series that at least can come close to the level that this series has been at. This episode was mostly building up for the finale of this series (only two more episodes left!), but it did this so well.

I liked how this episode used the school festival in order to bring some more life into Senkawa’s school. It was only meant to flesh out the setting a bit more, and the rest of the episode was about something completely different. With most anime, such a school festival usually is the most important topic going on.

But yeah, while the death of this episode was probably the least brutal of the bunch, it yet again made a lot of impact. In this case, Nataru only lives for his revenge, and he doesn’t care whether he has to slaughter children who never were the masterminds in anything, he just kills using the powers he obtained. It’s promising to be an incredible finale in any case.

I also wonder what the purpose was of Capella’s arrest. Was it just to wrap up one of the loose storylines, or was it meant to give the old hag a bit of development? It was pretty hilarious that she turned in Capella after keeping her in hiding for so long.

In any case, one thing in which the past Winter Season has stood out for me was the huge amount of series with good villains: the villains here are victims themselves, who have all the reason to defend themselves because Nataru keeps killing them off, and it’s not just this series: Satoshi in Michiko e Hatchin has been one of the best villains I’ve seen in a long while, Casshern Sins, Jigoku Shoujo and Tytania love playing with the definition of ‘villain’, and shows as Hajime no Ippo and Shikabane Hime Kuro have superbly characterized villains. Nearly all of them have intentions other than “I want to destroy the world because I’m evil”. Before this season started, I really disliked them, and hardly any series had a good villain. The only series in 2008 with really good villains like the ones shown in this season were Mouryou no Hako, Kaiba, Shion no Ou and Gunslinger Girl. That’s four series over an entire year! That’s nothing!

Jigoku Shoujo – 75

by psgels, posted in Jigoku Shoujo



Short Synopsis: A boy who is bullied by some of his classmates calls Jigoku Tsuushin.
Episode Rating: 8,5/10 (Awesome)
When talking about episodic series about a school setting, then the bullied kid is often a very popular storyline (or take any dark series set in school). I really have to say that this has been the best story about bullying I have ever seen. One of the most thought-provoking episodes of Jigoku Shoujo yet and yet again an awesome addition to the finale of the third season of this series.

Nearly always, these bullied stories are very exaggerated: the bullies are portrayed as pure evil, and the bullied one is entirely portrayed as the victim, or at the least the bullies are some sort of misguided villains. We should sympathize with the victims and hate the bullies, because that’s the politically correct thing to do. The best example I can think of right now is that episode Shigofumi dedicated to it. We could sympathize with the bullied one because he was just a good kid who only made one mistaken.

This episode showed that with bullying, people too often try to seek the problem with the bullies. The guy in this episode had enough reasons to be hated. He comes from a rich family, and is basically a spoiled brat, and yet he stood SO FAR away from the usual spoiled rich kids that anime has become notorious for. There’s this whole “I am better than you”-air around him, and that’s why he gets bullied, which only increases this air, spiralling out of control. Especially since the ones who bully him do so mostly because they hate how the guy is wasting money like he is. He continues to flaunt around with expensive tools, like very expensive watches, flat-screens and cameras, while the bullied guy has lost his father, has a sister who out of necessity needed to grow up fast in order to support her family because he himself is bad with the household chores.

Especially the scene in which Ai hands out Wanyuudo to the guy: he really expected himself to be the pure victim, even though he should be happy that he’s got so much money to spend. I think that he never really tried to talk things out with the bullies: whenever they start to threaten him, he’d just pay them off with money, or whatever gadget he was holding. It’s a very interesting kind of discrimination.

And damn… I could have sworn that we have seen one of the bullies before, but I can’t remember the exact episode in which that happened!

In any case, I’m surprised that the series is still going for revenges at this point, with only three episodes left. There was also hardly any Yuzuki in this episode, so I really wonder for what kind of climax the creators are going. It’s clear that they’re building up like crazy right now, and I’m not complaining about this at all, since the past few episodes have been absolutely amazing. And then again, the creators have had an entire season to fully plan in that climax of theirs, and they’ve also done a very successful climax twice before, so something really strange is going to have to happen in order to screw up the ending for the third season.

Tytania – 22

by psgels, posted in Tytania



Short Synopsis: Idris’ past
Episode Rating: 7,5/10 (Good)
Well, that’s a very strange place to start talking about people’s past. This episode really should have been shown much earlier in the series, and I can see really no reason to postpone it so long. This is supposed to be the start of the finale, the background should be done by now.

Still, it was a very welcome episode of course, that fully detailed Idris’ obsession with power, and where his ambitions come from: his dead father. I’m also surprised that Ajman only has been sitting on the throne for five years now. That just proves the point that the previous episode tried to make: Tytania is so caught up in inner struggles: everyone wants to be the one with the absolute power over such a large empire, and Idris as well. Jouslain is the only one who so far has managed to think beyond that.

And really, the mysteries around Lydia only continue to grow. The only thing she did in this episode was look sad because Balami (cursed Katakana that made me think that his name was spelled as BaRUami) would be away for a longer while due to Jouslain’s mission to clean up the mess that Zalish left.