Porfy no Nagai Tabi – 40

by psgels, posted in Porfy no Nagai Tabi



Short Synopsis: Porfy meets a bunch of idiots and grows as a character.
Highlights: You really don’t suspect this from the WMT!
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8,75/10
Whoa, Porfy! This isn’t something I saw coming. Bloody hell! With this episode, Porfy no Nagai Tabi really set itself apart from the other World Masterpiece Theatres, or at least the ones I’ve seen. The World Masterpiece Theatre may be an incredibly well written and versatile franchise, there’s one common theme that returns in every one of them I’ve seen so far: no matter how much they try to blend the borders between good and bad, the protagonist is always on the right side of justice. Whatever happens, the protagonist is a character who always tries the most noble of all solutions. And here Porfy comes.

But first a summary of the first half of the episode. Porfy is walking, and he’s getting rather tired. He sees a farm, and decides to stay there. Nobody’s home, but he sees a bed and decides to rest there. He gets woken up by a guy who looks like he’s in his late twenties. Porfy immediately wants to leave, but before he does he asks about Mina, who the guy obviously hasn’t seen. He then notices that the guy’s a painter, who’s much into modern art. Porfy then shows him some of his sketches (apparently, he’s been sketching in his free time), and they’re of course hilariously bad, though they’re getting better.

Porfy then tells the guy that he’s going to France, to search for his sister. It then turns out that the guy has the same plans, and he plans to head to Paris and study there to become a famous painter. Then, however, it seems that there’s more going on, when his angry mother comes to bother him because he didn’t show up for dinner again. He acts really rude against his mother, and claims that he needs to work hard to study for the concourse he’s entering. When the woman leaves, though, he doesn’t go to study, but instead happily chats with Porfy and goes to sleep afterwards.

Porfy is not upset because the guy is a lazy bum, but more because of the way he acts against his mother (having lost his parents, this obviously is understandable). His mother is also really unhappy with him, how he keeps slacking off. The next morning, Porfy prepares to leave because of this, but before he does, the guy’s mother shows up to bother him again, and he again tells her that he doesn’t have the time, and that he plans to leave her. He tells her how he regrets being born from his mother, and how he’d be able to live the easy life if he was born in Paris. He then remembers Porfy again, and invites himself to go with Porfy to Paris. Porfy then loses it and starts yelling at him, how he still has his parents. After that he immediately leaves the house.

Next up, Porfy walks past a suspicious-looking guy, and indeed he invites Porfy to sleep in his car. And indeed, he’s just trying to lead Porfy to a desolate part of the forest to rob him. Porfy however, notices this in time by questioning him about the car he’s in, and asking some smart questions about it. He tries to run away, but gets caught, but in the end he manages to fend off the attacker with a big stick and a lot of effort.

Porfy then sees a vegetable salesman, who is sitting by the road with his goods. The salesman hasn’t seen Mina, since he came from France. He buys one tomato from him, and then gets an interesting idea. He moves a big branch onto the road. When the salesman arrives with his truck, he stops to move the branch and in the meantime Porfy sneaks under some of the bags of what I assume is flower of some sort. The truck then arrives at the border. The guy seems to be familiar at the border, and the border-guards seem to know him. That’s why they don’t make too much effort in checking his load, so Porfy managed to get away undiscovered.

Porfy screws up when he tries to get off the truck, though. The salesman stops for a bit and Porfy tries to sneak off, but he’s too infatuated with the strange substance called “snow” that he forgets that he’s not supposed to be seen. He gets caught and the episode ends.

Really, Porfy has taken some relatively huge gambles in this episode. He could have just asked the guy to hide him, or waited for another car, but instead risked being discovered, and so got the quickest way across the French border. I must say that I like that a lot: Porfy is no longer the goodie two-shoes, and instead is starting to see that there are times when you need to ignore rules. It’s interesting: I always expected Porfy to just grow in a straightforward line: in the beginning, he’d meet guys who were out to get him, which made him stronger and less naive (which he also displayed in this episode). And yet at the same time, he heads into an entirely different but at the same time realistic direction.

This begs the question: what the heck have the creators in store for Mina?

Shikabane Hime – 02

by psgels, posted in Shikabane Hime



Short Synopsis: Three dead children come back as corpses
Highlights: Male lead takes some getting used to, but is more than just a damsel in distress (or a male version anyways).
Overall Enjoyment Value: 7,5/10
Aaah! Why did this series’ second episode have to air so soon? Basically, at this point I’m still desperately trying to figure out which shows I’m going to blog, and in this case I’m doubting between three series: Shikabane Hime, Kurozuka and Chaos Head, and I’ve got two spots for the three of them. Shikabane Hime has a cast with potential and an excellent soundtrack; Kurozuka has the best production-values of the season but its characters need a bit more work, and Chaos;Head… well I don’t have a freakin’ idea about it yet, but it’s supposed to be mystery and I’m a mystery-fanboy.

So, yeah. For now I’m going to blog this thing, but do expect it to disappear again if I get blown away by Chaos;Head and Kurozuka’s second episode. The thing that especially intrigues me about this series is its director: the director of Gilgamesh. This guy knows his subtlety, and he’s just been assigned to the most un-subtle production-studio you can imagine: Gainax. The result is pretty interesting: quiet moments that take their time in building up, and yet it’s got hitting action-scenes. I’m hoping for this series to take the best of both extremes. And yeah; because of the male lead and this series’ relations to Gilgamesh (and probably also because most people are expecting this to be the next Gurren Lagann), I’m expecting this series to not really become that popular.

Another reason why I decided to blog this series was that within only two episodes, we’ve already seen quite a few sides of the male lead, and he’s definitely not a stereotype, which has potential for this series’ second season. The guy will feel annoying in this episode, though, especially in the way that he stands in the way of Machina like that. It’s also quite rare for such a guy to actually be voiced by a voice-actor that still sounds young, who still has that nose-sound in his voice. It’s a shame that the children in this episode were obviously voiced by adults that tried to be overly squeaky, but I guess that that can’t be helped.

If I’m still blogging this series next week, then the creators need to pay attention to the ultimate villains of this series, and don’t make them stereotypical bad guys who are out to destroy the world. The children in this episode were a fine example of enemies that were neither good nor bad, so let’s hope it can keep things that way.

Casshern Sins – 02

by psgels, posted in Casshern Sins



Short Synopsis: Casshern ends up at a small refugee village of robots.
Highlights: Surprisingly solid.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8/10
As for the shows I’m not blogging (as usual, this isn’t really about “is this good?”, but “do I feel like writing about it every single week?):
– I almost wanted to blog Tales of the Abyss, but then Mouryou no Hako and the 12-year-old girl who strangely was a guardian convinced me not to for now.
– Hearing “urusai urusai urusai” once was enough to convince me to never go near Toradora again.
– Hyakko is funny, but the characters feel a bit flat.

So, basically because of the large amount of series that are continuing from previous seasons, and Tytania (the one that won my little contest, a month ago), I only have the room to blog five new series. If Tales of the Abyss would have aired during a lighter season, I definitely would have ended up blogging it. There’s also the matter that three series that I’m planning to blog haven’t even aired yet (and because I’ve only heard a few very vague details of what they’re about, they still can utterly disappoint me), so who knows?

In any case, even though I didn’t like the first episode, I’m going to blog Casshern. Even though the main character is a bit emo, there’s a lot of good stuff in this series. It probably is one of the most solid series to have aired this season, and the slow pacing contributes to that. But what I especially like is the different variety of robots that Casshern runs into, and how they’re trying to live within the mess he caused them. The concept of robots is a bit strange here, and it’s almost like they’re stuck somewhere between humans and robots. They’re made of metal, and yet they can think, and be killed very easily. It seems that there’s either no mechanic left that can repair them, no cure against the rust, or no new metal to replace broken parts. There’s a story going around, that if you eat Casshern, you’ll be saved from the inner destruction. My guess is that that’s some sort of rumour, started by someone who wants to get rid of Casshern.

But really, seeing how everyone in this world is just waiting for destruction. It makes for a very appealing premise. And so far, I really like the side-characters. And about Casshern: he can grow enough, with 22 more episodes to go. Even though he’s emo, he’s not stupid. He wants to find out what the heck he’s done. Memory loss was very well done in Kaiba, so why not here?

Then there’s the matter of this show’s staff. I honestly got scared when I learned that the director of this series was the one behind several Dragonball Z movies. But then it got me thinking: I’ve spent so many seasons, preparing by looking at the staff list, and that only turns out to be reliable in 50% of the cases. There’s only a handful of directors that can really be consistent in their work, like Akiyuki Shinbou, or Koichi Masahino. In fact, quite a lot of my favourite series were directed by people who also directed more questionable series: the director of Toward the Terra screwed up with Itazura na Kiss, the director of The Third went on to direct Penguin no Mondai afterwards (what the heck!?), the director of Shion no Ou also did series as Dragon Drive, Beyblade and Tenjou Tenge. So, why not? At least I can say that Casshern doesn’t feel like anything Dragonball Z at all. Who knows?

Red Garden – Dead Girls

by psgels, posted in Red Garden



Short Synopsis: About 200 years after Red Garden, we return to the girls of Red Garden, who still turn out to be alive.
Highlights: It’s about bloody time!
Overall Enjoyment Value: 7,5/10
So, finally the final OVA has gotten subbed, more than a year after the original airdate. Indeed, it’s about bloody time. To clarify: I’m not going to write a review about this series, simply because my memory is just too fuzzy about the majority of the series, and I can’t recall exactly what I liked so much about the original series. Let’s just leave it at that Red Garden was my second-favourite in the season it aired in, after Asatte no Houkou.

In any case, it was pretty much clear from the start that Dead Girls would be a disaster, but I do have a lot of positive things to say about it. First of all, I really admire the GUTS of the creators: go for a conclusion that’s completely different from the TV-series. Seriously, more series should attempt that. As it turns out, the lead characters indeed revived, though without any memories. After that, they’ve been living for 200 years, working as bounty-hunters and travelling the world. What I really liked about these two episodes was the chemistry between them, especially in the quiet moments. The characters underwent massive changes, and the way the creators explored these changes were really enjoyable.

But really, what the heck happened to the production-values of this series? This is supposed to be an OVA: the creators got extra time to get the graphics right, and yet the animation was just plain and the CG was downright horrible. What have the creators been doing in that half a year? Then there’s also the fact that Dead Girls answers no questions at all that Red Garden left hanging, and introduced a huge amount of new ones: why have all the side-characters reincarnated at the same time? Why did Lise turn into an android? Where did the giant robots come from? Why is the Red Garden still in its same state, 200 years later? What the heck was up with that climax?

Really, I feel that Gonzo would have done better if it went with the route of Clannad, xxxHolic and Nodame Cantabile: just go for a short second season. Dead Girls actually had a lot of potential, but there’s no way that you’re going to fit that in just two episodes. These two episodes did well in fleshing the characters out, but the thing is just too damn short. I also liked the girls’ theme song. It sounded pretty silly at the beginning, but once you start thinking about it, it does fit.

Some quick first Impressions: Kurozuka, Bihada Ichizoku and Stitch!

by psgels, posted in Kurozuka, Some Quick First Impressions

Kurozuka

Short Synopsis: Our lead character meets a mysterious woman who lives in the forest, while fleeing for people who are out to kill him.
Highlights: A LOT to like, a LOT to dislike
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8/10
I must say that I watched this right after being pumped up with adrenaline from Mouryou no Hako, so this series may have had a bit of an unfair advantage. Still, with that bit of adrenaline, I really loved this episode: the production-values are just awesome, the OP is the best of the season, the mysterious post-apocalyptic-samurai-setting sounded very interesting, and the horror-styled storytelling was excellent, and it keeps you on your toes. Still, there were a few things that might hurt this series in the future, so despite these excellent bits, I’m not going to label this series as among the best of the season yet. The thing that needed the most work was the cast of characters. They’re not fleshed out well enough, and the development was a bit too soon. The kiss came from nowhere, and especially the way that the lead character just “forgave” the woman that she brutally killed his partner. There’s also the superhuman powers that are a bit on the weak side, especially the way that the main character seemed to be virtually fine after being stabbed multiple times, among which in the stomach. What this series needs to do is the following: flesh out the characters; show different sides of them; show what they’re doing when they’re not on a mission. This premise is too good to be ruined by a faulty cast!

Bihada Ichizoku

Short Synopsis: Our lead character is the prettiest girl in the world.
Highlights: Mary Sue! Mary Sue! Mary Sue!
Overall Enjoyment Value: 1,5/10
Ooh… the pain. The horrible, horrible pain! Who the hell writes this rubbish? I was pretty sure that Rosario to Vampire would take up the title of “worst first episode of the season”, and I’m so NOT pleased to see this series beat it. Really, it feels like this episode was directed by someone without any experience at all, someone who’d probably never even seen a proper anime or movie. That and a schedule that was way too tight are probably the only thing that could possibly explain the crap that’s supposed to be storytelling. Those glowy-eyes were probably the worst about this episode. For God’s sake, did nobody ever point out to the creators that that absolutely doesn’t work?

Stitch!

Short Synopsis: Our lead character meets a mischievous alien.
Highlights: Obviously aimed at children, but strangely charming.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 7/10
Let me make use of this chance by saying that I absolutely HATE Disney’s western TV-series, based on their famous franchises. They’re nearly always just cheap rip-offs of their original franchises, that use just the names and characters to get people to watch them, they’ve got a mediocre and often stupid plot and there’s no room for character-development because then they’d fall out of the line with their original character. So no, I wasn’t looking forward to this one at all, especially after having seen its western counterpart. Though I have to admit: the set-up that the eastern creators chose for does allow for character-development. This episode very much established the bond between Yuuna (yes: Yuuna; not Lilo) and Stitch, and this bond between them has all the potential to grow. There’s an interesting sense of innocence between the two, and they feel like children. Unfortunately, this series downright sucks when it attempts action-scenes. They’re way too energetic and unrealistic to be taken seriously, and the bad guys are just way too stereotypical.

Some quick first impressions: ef – a tale of melodies, One Outs and Mouryou no Hako

by psgels, posted in Mouryou no Hako, Some Quick First Impressions

ef – a tale of melodies

Short Synopsis: Our lead characters are the side-characters from ef.
Highlights: Perhaps the foreshadowing was a bit too shallow, but gorgeous visuals and solid storytelling.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 7,5/10
I liked ef, but I agree with the big criticism against it: its “I love you-now let’s have sex”-mentality. It’s a bit unrealistic, considering how well-written the rest of the series was. This episode too had such a moment, where a girl drew herself in the nude, in the middle of an empty classroom. I mean, perhaps she could do that because ef’s world is totally empty apart from its important characters, but it does take away a bit of the believability. Nevertheless, this episode was very solid, and a good contender for the best teenaged romance this season, along with Clannad. It’s very good to see that the creators spent a lot of time on their dialogue and visuals, and it’s good to see another Shaft-series without Shinbo behind the director’s seat. No offence, but I’m beginning to get a bit tired of his style.

One Outs

Short Synopsis: Our lead characters lives on the bad side of humanity.
Highlights: Whoa, intense.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8/10
I haven’t looked at the staff list for this show or anything, but something really tells me that the staff of Akagi and Kaiji is behind this one, or at least it’s a bunch of people who are trying to go for the same style: the character-designs are kept ugly for a reason, a lot of emphasis is put on gambling, (this is not, I repeat NOT a regular baseball-series), there are mind games a plenty, there are a few guys who stand miles above the others in terms of skills, and the pacing is sloooooooooooooooow. This series could go down the same path as Kaiji, so there’s no way I’m going to blog this, but nevertheless this episode was very intense. And: it’s a story about adults. Always good in this season of teenagers.
Edit: well, what do you know, I was right. The entire staff of Akagi and Kaiji seems to be behind this. Prepare for lots of adrenaline and dragged on dialogues!

Mouryou no Hako

Short Synopsis: Our lead characters gets befriended with a mysterious girl.
Highlights: Shoujo ai and Horror. What could possibly get better than that?
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8,75/10
Omg! Omg! What an awesome first episode! After Jigoku Shoujo, this ranks as the best of the past season, and I’m really glad to see some more good horror back this season. This episode was in itself a standalone story, and it really showed that the people behind this series know what it takes to come with a good short story: the characters are fleshed out first, there’s a bit of very tense drama here and there, and the end ends with hitting character-development. There also were a number of artistic moments here and there, for example when the girls danced around in the field of flowers, but I found that it contributed really well to the overall atmosphere. Obviously, this is not a series for everyone: if you need overly cute girls, fanservice or comedy in your anime, you’ll be disappointed here. But personally, I LOVE this series so far!

Eve no Jikan – Sammi

by psgels, posted in Eve no Jikan



Short Synopsis: Rikuo suspects Sammi of lying to him and wants to get to the bottom of it.
Highlights: Rikuo is turning into a pretty interesting character.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8/10
Okay, since I’m pretty much of the beta-sciences, I still have a bit of trouble trying to grasp the notion of real intelligence, as defined in this series. I mean, I fully believe that in the future, as long as the science advances, computers can be built with human consciousness and emotions. I however don’t think that this can just “appear” out of the blue, or as an accident. Why would someone design a cleaning-robot with human consciousness? Ergo Proxy solved this in a pretty interesting way, where it combined science fiction with fantasy by introducing a virus from higher-up that introduces self-consciousness for robots.

Just as I hoped, this episode shed a bit more light about how this could have happened in the first place. The TV-commercials and programs emphasized the evilness of Dori-kei. It’s being made ridiculous everywhere, as if someone high-ranked is desperately trying to give the robotic consciousness a bad name. I think it’s those mysterious people that appear at the end of the episode. I think that these robots originally were designed to really be like humans, and to act as companions, and just when these models were fully designed and produced, and acted just like humans, it turned out that this consciousness had a very nasty side-effect. This is why people who get too attached to robots are made ridiculous, to stop whatever nasty side-effect there is from getting out. I also think that Eve no Jikan is pretty much linked to this, in an attempt to resist these actions.

In the meantime, this episode did a pretty good job at fleshing out its characters. Rikuo turns out to be a closet Dori-kei, while his best friend Masaki seems to be turning into one of this series’ antagonists. It’s also quite fun to see the random people that decide to visit Eve no Jikan. It’s different in every episode, an din this way, it would have been pretty easy to make this series a 13-episode TV-series, simply by showing random visiters to the cafe, and it would also have allowed the setting to get a bit more airtime. Really, something tells me that the ending of this series is about to get rushed.

Chi’s Sweet Home Review – 82,5/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews



“A small kitten moves in to a random family”. That doesn’t seem like the most original or exciting premise, now does it? Still, we’re looking here at the best comedy to have started airing in the past half year. You can count on MadHouse to make such a questionable premise work.

Basically, this series is spread over 104 episodes of 3 minutes, each of which explores the daily life of Chi and the family that adopts her. Especially Chi, but also the rest of the cast develop through the course of the series into downright adorable characters. The creators really succeeded into portraying the characters, just like regular people with their own problems, like making deadlines for work, properly raising kids and of course taking care of your cat, while it remains light-hearted through the entire process.

But the thing that really sells this series is Chi’s antics. I’m allergic to cats myself, but after watching this series, I can fully understand why people would take one in their home. It’s just so much fun to see the little Chi play around in the world, where everything is big and new and a whole new experience. Especially seeing her clashing with the family’s life-style results into a bunch of awesome episodes.

What’s the most peculiar about this series, though, is that it’s directed by the guy you’d least likely assume to be able to pull off such a cute series: Mitsuyuki Masuhara, the episode director of manly series as Death Note and Gungrave and the assistant director of Shigurui and Tokyo Tribe. I’m not sure what really made him decide to go for such a different series, but he really pulled it off here and he developed the characters into an excellent cast. The episodes are varied, some of them build up for each other, and you’ll never really know when one of them will just be entertaining or downright awesome. If you’re looking for a feel-good series that you can laugh with, then Chi’s Sweet Home is a very nice recommendation.

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

Some quick first impressions: Macademi Wasshoi, Skip Beat and Vampire Knight Guilty

by psgels, posted in Some Quick First Impressions

Macademi Wasshoi

Short Synopsis: Our lead character gets loved by two cute girls.
Highlights: As if this season hadn’t already enough annoying and overly cute girls…
Overall Enjoyment Value: 6/10
Really, I was sure that Kemeko Deluxe would have won the title for most unrealistic series of the season, but this series sure proved me wrong on that one. There are a LOT of annoying things about this series: overly cute girls fall for him for shallow or no reasons, the OP and ED are… terrible to say the least, the lead character does nothing to move away from the stereotypes, and of course, School in this series doesn’t mean studying, but instead destroying things. Still, I have to give this series some slack. Sure, it’s badly written, but at the same time, the creators also made an effort to be original. Macademy Wasshoi doesn’t exactly feel like your standard harem, simply because of the huge amounts of ideas (good and bad) that the creators tried to stuff into this episode. That does have potential.

Skip Beat

Short Synopsis: Our lead character is the girlfriend of a famous idol.
Highlights: Excellent script-writers
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8,5/10
So, from the few things I’ve heard about this series, it was the most anticipated shoujo-series of this Autumn-Season. After Vampire Knight, though, I obviously didn’t believe in that hype, since that series pretty much destroyed my faith in shoujo-series. However, I now see that Skip Beat had all the reasons to be anticipated. In terms of writing, this had the best first episode of the season. It’s only been the first episode of the series, and the lead character already has multiple facets of her past explained, she has developed significantly, she is fleshed out, I’m pretty amazed at the stuff that the creators managed to put in just one episode. No scene feels wasted, and this episode definitely left an impression on me. What I also love about this series is the character-designs: at first sight, you wouldn’t suspect that they’re from 2008, and they’ve got this old look. Very nice effect.

Vampire Knight Guilty

Short Synopsis: Our lead character tries to find out what happened at the end of the previous season.
Highlights: Much of the same: angst and bishies.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 6,5/10
Speaking of the devil, I don’t think I’m going to continue Vampire Knight’s second season. Thirteen episodes were fine and all, but I don’t feel like sitting through the same yet again, especially after Skip Beat just surpassed it in every single aspect in just one episode and Nodame Cantabile’s second season is also about to start. One look at Zero reminded me of why I had so many problems with watching this in the first place. If, for some strange reason, the second season does turn out to be awesome I might marathon it later, but for now I just don’t feel like wasting my time on more angst and bishies. Although I do have to admit: that new ED rocks!

Blade of the Immortal – 07

by psgels, posted in Blade of the Immortal



Short Synopsis: Shizuma asks the help of a familiar character to get rid of Manji.
Highlights: Rin.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8,5/10
Ah, I’m really beginning to see where Bee-Train plans to go with the first 13 episodes of this series (who knows how long it will be in the end?). Its general rule of thumb is “don’t introduce any complex or complicated plot-twists or character-development unless the characters are developed”. And indeed, this series so far has been mostly action-scenes, and fleshing out Rin and Manji. At the same time, we also already get a bit of a taste of the major characters of the later arcs. I don’t know exactly how much of the manga Bee-Train changed, but this does explain why the plot has felt relatively simple so far.

And albeit slowly, the plot is definitely moving. Shizuma doesn’t turn out to be a major character at all, because in this episode he dies. Same as the old grandmother who delivered Manji and Shizuma their worms. That by the way was about as untypical as a major death in anime as you can get. There was no blown-up drama. Shizuma just stepped outside of his cottage, and when he stepped back in, he already killed her with his poison. I was surprised to find out about her grandchild, by the way. At the end of the episode, it still lives, so I’m curious whether it’s going to appear again.

In any case, I keep getting more impressed by Rin, who’s turning into much more than just a damsel in distress. Even though she’s nowhere as strong as the other guys in this series, she does what she can in order to help Manji. And even when she does get captured, these raw emotions of fear are very nicely portrayed. And at the end, she’s able to set herself past these traumatic experiences. You can really see her mature.