Chocolate Underground Review – 37,5/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews



Oh boy. I got impatient with the slow subs, so I decided to just check out the raws for this series, just to get things over with. Believe me; it really deserves to remain unsubbed. If you were already turned off by the first half, just be happy you didn’t get to see the second half…

In any case, for those of you who don’t know: Chocolate Underground is Production IG’s latest work, which tells in 13 five-minute episodes the story where an evil party has taken over the government and banned all sorts of chocolate. At first sight, it promised to be an interesting and short look at fascism and communism. Eventually, it turned into an abomination with the “we rock they suck”-mentality.

The first half at least knows how to build up, and it introduces the potentially interesting characters of Huntley and Smudger. It successfully portrayed how the people feel oppressed, and try to do something against the government by holding secret chocolate parties. It’s all fine when these events remain on a small scale, even though the evil chocolate-banning party is obviously a reference to China, and something tells me that it’s not just a coincidence that this series aired right before the Olympic Games in Beijing.

Unfortunately, as this series enters its second half, it becomes clear that the creators didn’t even know what they were building up for and the entire series gets resolved into one of the worst conclusions I’ve ever seen. In the end, a bunch of very blatant Deus ex Machina help the oppressed children overthrow the government in a boring cheese-fest that’s downright insulting to intelligence. The adults don’t even struggle back, they just magically “see the light” and give up their life ambitions like a bit of cheesecake.

Overall, this is the piece of junk you show children to make themselves feel special and more important than adults. I wasn’t expecting much, but the climax of this series was downright insulting. It’s not like short series with only 5-minute episodes are doomed to fail. Hanoka for example was a very cute series, despite its short length, but Chocolate Underground looks like it was directed by a bunch of 12-year olds, not the director of Wellber and Library Wars.

Storytelling: 2/10
Characters: 4/10
Production-Values: 7/10
Setting: 2/10

Macross Frontier – 21

by psgels, posted in Macross Frontier



Short Synopsis: Most of the episode sees Ranka, as she tries to sort out her own feelings.
Highlights: Well, at least the love-triangle progressed a lot.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 7,5/10
Well, this had to happen, I guess. Ranka’s still my least favourite character in this series, so an episode that focuses nearly entirely on her obviously isn’t as exciting as the past few episodes were. It’s really a calm-before-the-storm episode, where everything gets set up for the finale. It’s a bit of a bummer that the finale is going to be about a bunch of teenaged lovers who chase after each other, but there’s still enough potential left for some nice action-scenes. I just hope that now that Sheryl’s chances of getting it on with Alto are gone, she won’t turn into a useless side-character who can only watch.

In the meantime, it was an interesting plan of how Luka came up with the plan to get rid of the swarm of Vajra: get them all on one island, remove all people from that island and blow it up. I wonder where that swarm came from, by the way. I originally thought that it spawned from Ranka’s little friend, but in this episode it showed that it turned into something completely different, and different from most of the brainless Vajra-enemies we’ve seen thus far.

I’m also interested in what happened to Ozma and his lover. We never saw them getting caught, so they’re still on the run somewhere. I’m interested in what they can do for this series’ final four episodes. They’re along with Sheryl about the only ones who are on to Leon’s complot, so I wonder how they’re going to pull it off to kill the guy.

Detroit Metal City – 01

by psgels, posted in Detroit Metal City



Short Synopsis: Krauser II records his first music video.
Highlights: Again, first half is original content, the second half is the same as the introduction.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 7,5/10
Okay, so I mistook the introduction and the first episode for the same, while in fact the introduction took parts of the first two episodes. If you haven’t seen the introduction yet, just skip it and go with episode 01 and 02, as every scene in it is included in either one of these episodes. This post is also more for completion’s sake.

In any case, the new part of this episode nicely added to Negishi’s bipolar and schizophrenic personality. This guy really has issues, but I guess that it’s also a strange form of social commentary, which takes the Japanese attitude of staying politically correct all the time to the extreme.

Detroit Metal City – 02

by psgels, posted in Detroit Metal City



Short Synopsis: “Krauser II” and his friends go on a date to make up for what went on in the music store.
Highlights: Half of it was already showed at the introduction.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 7/10
Wait, am I missing something here? The first half of this episode was exactly the same as the first half of the introduction. Does that mean that the first episode contained the second half of the introduction, along with more original content? Talk about a confusing episode order.

In any case, the second half of this episode was less exciting than the introduction, with as highlight the sudden appearance of the band “Tetrapod Melon Tea”. The introduction got away with the huge stereotypes, but they’re already getting dull in this episode. Especially that drummer didn’t work too well. Although I do admit that it was interesting to see the split personalities of the DMC-members.

Battle Programmer Shirase Review – 72,5/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews



In the realm of strange series, Battle Programmer Shirase obviously can’t be missing. It’s a very short series with only fifteen episodes of ten minutes each, and it tells about the adventures of a legendary hacker. Those who are expecting a series that explores the ins and outs of the hacking-business can just shut down this window and look elsewhere, because at heart, BPS is just another romantic comedy.

The realism in this series is like some distant legend. We’re talking here about hackers who can crash satellites into earth’s atmosphere and little girls who can single-handedly take care of the security of the ministry for defence, and that’s just the tip of the ice berg. Everything computer-related is over the top on purpose, and that makes for a fun watch, especially if you’ve got something with computers (which I guess is the case with most of the people who visit this site). But oh boy, this series does have its issues.

Its biggest problem is that it doesn’t seem to really know what it wants. The result is comedy that feels like a shot of a shotgun shell: it shattered all over the place. There’s no real central theme or message that keeps the series together and each arc feels more ad hoc than that some real thoughts were put behind them. It makes you wonder why the creators went with such a bizarre series length of fifteen episodes to begin with, because the series also ends when the overall storyline is about to get started. Why couldn’t the creators just have gone with a regular airing of 13 or 26 episodes?

Then there’s the romance, with is just like the rest of this series: weird and hit or miss. We here have a couple that consists out of a ten year old girl and her twenty-five year old great uncle. Obviously, the fanservice jokes that result from that are rather predictable, but admittedly, their relationship, how weird it may be, does remain fresh through the series.

There’s also a lot of repetition in this series, even though it already was incredibly small. Each episode has at least a minute of recap about what happened in the previous episode, and there’s one particular minute-long sequence that gets repeated for FIVE TIMES through the series. What went on in the creators’ minds to approve of that, I don’t know…

Still, despite all this, the creators actually know that this series is rubbish, and just try to make the best of it. You can really see that the creators are critical of their own anime. This is one series that makes fun of itself, and actually succeeds, which I guess is where the short airtime comes in: it’s a short and fun series to watch if you’re stuck at home on a rainy day and need something light to watch. This is a series with style, no matter how strange it may be.

Storytelling: 8/10
Characters: 7/10
Production-Values: 7/10
Setting: 7/10

Bonen no Xamdou – 07

by psgels, posted in Bonen no Xamdou



Short Synopsis: Haru’s letters reach Akiyuki, and a possibility for the two of them to meet pops up.
Highlights: Another building-up episode, but this time the Xam’d and humanforms got some extra depth.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8/10
Another solid and enjoyable for Bonen no Xamdou. I think that this is the pattern we can expect for much of the rest of the first half of this series: mostly fleshing out the characters and building up the storyline, with your occasional action-sequence like the attack on Sentan-island and the Xam’d going berserk. The question is now whether the second half of this series can effectively make use of all the time that was spent on building up in the first half, but we still need to wait a couple of months before we get the answer to that. In any case, so far the first half has been wonderfully down to earth, and that’s why I like this series so far.

In the meantime, Haru’s still very worried about what happened to Akiyuki. As it turns out, the Xam’d was killed relatively easy, but the real purpose of it going berserk was to show that it wasn’t looking for trouble, it was just a pregnant woman who wanted to live, and at the same time show a strange pillar in the sky that only the Xam’d and Haru could see. The question is obviously: why could Haru see it and everybody else not? It’s probably got something to do with Akiyuki.

I also wonder what Haru’s going to do when she finally meets Akiyuki. Will she continue to stay with the military? Will she desert it and join the crew of the Zanbani (that would be rather lame, by the way)? Meanwhile, Akiyuki’s little adventure alone reminded me of the time when Renton went off on his own in Eureka7, although their reasons are totally different. There hasn’t been any real tension so far between Akiyuki and the crew, unlike with Eureka7, where the crew of the Gekko-go kept teasing Renton over and over again. Bonen no Xamdou is much more a coming of age story for Haru than that it is for Akiyuki.

This episode also again blurred the line between the Xam’d and the humanforms. It’s like humanforms are a lesser form of the Xam’d. The guy that Akiyuki meets in this episode: we’re still not sure whether he’s a humanform or a Xam’d, since his symptoms looked exactly like Akiyuki’s. But on the other hand, when even these common people are able to at least gain their senses back after having been Xam’d, then why is Sentan Island’s military having so much trouble to deal with just one of them?

Himitsu ~The Revelation~ – 21

by psgels, posted in Himitsu ~The Revelation~



Short Synopsis: A previously unmentioned Daiku-member is found dead.
Highlights: Finally the cast in this series feels complete!
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8,5/10
Oh boy, they should have done this episode much sooner. It’s strange, but it finally feels that the cast has been introduced, and that with only three more episodes to go! With this episode, we learned a bit more about the final member who always remained in the shadows a bit (the red-haired woman whose name I forgot), and strangely enough, the cast also felt very complete with this episode. Screw the statement that this series isn’t good at characterizations. Sure, the characters don’t develop nearly as much as with other series, but at least with this episode, they’re fleshed out well.

I can’t believe that it took me this long to notice, but even though this is an incredibly inconsistent series, there have been two major themes throughout the episode: the first is the obvious Suzuki-storyline, and the second is a theme that you hardly get to see in anime in this form: the relationship with your wife that actually isn’t overblown. It’s one very realistic aspect in this series: each member of Daiku has his or her own love-life that doesn’t have anything to do with their job (apart from Aoki and Maki, perhaps. Ironically, still single).

But this episode did convince me: a second season for this series would rock, and the creators still have so much more to play with. Unfortunately, this is Madhouse we’re talking about. They nearly always go for new premises, instead of continuing old ones. And in a way, in the long run I like this approach better. Okay, it does leave a number of unfinished stories that way, but the other extreme is just as bad: just continue to make series of premises that already exist and which you know will rake in cash (like what Sunrise is doing right now, or even more blatantly, those recently introduced Haruhi spin-offs). The gaming-industry is currently showing what happens when such a mentality gets taken to the extreme: only sequels and hardly anything original. In the end, I do prefer the variety, so I can understand it if Madhouse would just end this series with a bang and then move on to other fresh premises.

Ultraviolet: Code 044 – 09

by psgels, posted in Ultraviolet: Code 044



Short Synopsis: Zakusa and Daxus’ armies face off against each other.
Highlights: An action-packed episode that works.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8,5/10
Excellent episode. The building-up of the past few episodes really paid off with a very exciting episode. I’m glad that despite the negative reactions, I kept watching this series, because even though it’s nothing deep, complex or special, I’ve been enjoying every minute of it. Osamu Dezaki rocks!

There’s of course nothing much to say about such an action-episode, apart of course from Zakusa’s death, and how he still helped 044 and Garcia escape when his army finally got defeated. In the end, it turns out that he was also in the debt of Luka’s boss, the cult leader. These guys obviously have enough tricks up their sleeve for escape, since they’ve managed to stay hidden for that long. This also answers the question of “how the heck is Luka going to track down 04?”

This episode also showed that Daxus II is a very proud and cocky person, and he likes to gloat over his victims when he knows that they’re not a threat. That’s of course going to be the thing that’ll kill him in the end: my prediction is that he and 044 somehow face off together, after which her superior skills end up killing him. The question is of course how they get to that point, what Luka and Garcia can bring in and how the creators are planning to fill up those final three episodes.

RD Sennou Chousashitsu – 21

by psgels, posted in RD Sennou Chousashitsu



Short Synopsis: Souta struggles with his feeling, while the top executives plan to do… something…
Highlights: Talking, talking and more talking. Oh, and some very nice romance.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 7,5/10
Ugh, at times like these I regret being the only raw blogger of this series. Something major definitely got started in this episode, but those top officials are like a bunch of walking dictionaries. Usually, I can pick up enough Japanese to understand an episode, but this was one major exception to that. The online dictionary I use wasn’t of much help either, because the words it suggested kept making no sense in their context… If someone did understand what exactly happened in this episode: care to explain?

In any case, the romance-parts of this episodes were something I did understand, and they were really well done. Even though this is a typical building-up episode, Souta finally decided to buy a gift for Holon and break up from sleeping with his boss. Nothing really happens between him and Holon, but that’s only a matter of time.

Haru can also fully walk again, albeit with the help of a walking-stick. Kushima also seemed really happy with that news. This really was a big episode for him, especially since what happened to the guy at the end of the episode. All “that was revealed was that he was “swept away”, but what exactly that means is up for the next episode.

Legendary Gambler Tetsuya Review – 82,5/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews



Well, time for me to pimp another very unknown series. This one comes completely subbed, courtesy of a one-man fansub group (who did a very admirable job, by the way), and it tells about Tetsuya, a legendary gambler and Mah-jong player. For the past few years, Akagi has turned into the symbol of Mah-Jong anime, but this series shows that it wasn’t the pioneer of the genre.

When I first started to watch this series, and realized that this series plays a lot of emphasis on cheating, I expected some sort of combination between Akagi and Kaiji, but that comparison turned to be a bit off, as there are some subtle differences. Tetsuya doesn’t really try to get very deep into the heads of the different players, but it’s much more about different cheating-techniques and its characters. In Kaiji, all the gamblers are referred to as human trash, while Tetsuya shows a more human side of them.

Tetsuya doesn’t try to go as deep as Akagi and Kaiji, but it did avoid these two series’s biggest weakness: their horribly slow pacing. Tetsuya’s pacing is quick and to the point that it never really drags, so that we can get to see a wide variety of players through the limited time of only 20 episode. There’s never really a moment to get bored. Even the final arc only takes up two episodes, instead of dragging things out in an attempt to create tension.

And the characters really shine. A lot of them are very interesting to watch, as they either team up with or play against Tetsuya, considering their limited screen-time. My favourite was the match against Innami, the walking corpse. He’s an excellent example of a character that shatters the boundaries of good and evil.

One complaint is that at times, it becomes clear that this series was based on a much larger manga. Thankfully, each arc is a standalone story, but there are a few story-threads that get introduced, and yet never answered. Boshu’s wife never makes an appearance, even though including her would have greatly fleshed out Boshu’s character. There’s also one character in the OP that never appears in the actual series. You can’t help but wonder what’s up with that.

Overall, I don’t think that this series is going to be better than Akagi (I’ll get back to that statement once I get the chance to finish that series), but nevertheless Tetsuya is a simple but effective series with a cast of great characters. It in any case deserves to get more attention than what it’s getting right now.

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