RD Sennou Chousashitsu – 09

by psgels, posted in RD Sennou Chousashitsu


Whoa, such a difference from the previous episodes. This episode takes all the focus away from Minamo, Haru and Holon, and instead focuses on Souta and especially his father. As it turns out, he’s a businessman, and he’s the chief of the unit that keeps the metal up and running. Perhaps this was already revealed in a previous episode, but I’m having enough trouble understanding this series as it is, and this episode was particularly dialogue-heavy.

Having said that, though, this episode was really good. It’s a bit like a social commentary, and how much people have become dependant of the metal. In this episode, it only goes down for a few minutes, and it’s already featured in the news, and the responsible one (Souta’s father) has been demoted. Again, it makes sense: today, more and more people become dependant on the internet.

So, if I understood things correctly: everything started with that red phenomenon, we saw in episode one. Kushima then probably oversaw the creation of the metal, based on that red phenomenon. I think that that’s where the whole issue of cyber-diving comes from, as it’s starting to look like the metal is an extension of the ocean, like how in this episode, a virus managed to reach the main database through the ocean.

Souta’s relationship with his father was a breath of fresh air in terms of having parents who are very busy with their jobs. Anime usually make a very big deal out of this, but Real Drive handled it subtly. Of course, when he was young, and his mother left to Australia to raise Minamo with her own mother, he was left all alone, and of course he felt sad, but over time, he began to accept the fact that his father is a busy man, and instead he decided to help him whenever he could. Quite a change from Production IG’s previous major anime: Ghost Hound, where Masayuki and his family totally grew away from each other.

I’m really surprised at how little hate there is in this series. So far, the only real evil intentions came from Kushima’s boss (who Souta turns out to be sleeping with O.o) and the hackers from episode four. And yet none of them feel like real villains, like you usually see in anime. Usually, anime add in a little grudge here and there, to spice things up a bit, but in Real Drive, most of the conflict comes from people’s own interpretations to how they should live.

I’m really loving this series more and more, simply because it’s one of these series that attempts to do something new and innovative. It’s series like this one that keep pushing anime further, instead of repeating the same harem over and over. Seriously, what is so great about watching ten different series in which a guy gets surrounded by five or six different girls with different distinctive personalities/stereotypes? I can understand why you want to watch such a series once or twice, but what’s the merit of watching virtually the same thing ten or more times after each other? What seems to be that hidden charm of series as To Love-ru and Kanokon that I can’t seem to understand, aside from the obvious fanservice? Is this the “anime as escapism” that people seem to be talking about lately?

Crystal Blaze – 09

by psgels, posted in Crystal Blaze


Awesome episode! Only now I realize how similar this series is to Kurenai: we have Shinkurou taking care of Murasaki versus Shu, taking care of Sara. Manami and Ayaka are comparable to Shinkurou’s two neighbours, while Poririn and the tech-guy whose name I forgot are similar to Benika. In Kurenai, the bad guy is a family, obsessed over their own bloodline, while Crystal Blaze has a crazy scientist who’s obsessed over his own research. Both evil parties also have well-trained goons and spend the first 8 episodes, trying to track down the good party.

The big difference is that Crystal Blaze puts a lot of emphasis on storytelling, while the big focus of Kurenai is the dialogue. As a result, Crystal Blaze has a plot that continues to develop with lots of interesting twists and turns, and Kurenai is at its best when characters are just talking to each other. If I had to be honest, then I’d say that I like Crystal Blaze better, but that’s mostly because of how well it handled the beginning of its finale, when compared to Kurenai. I didn’t pay much attention to it when I watched the latest episode of Kurenai, but the fact remains that Kurenai’s wish to go back to his home one more time, even though they were discovered was stupid, while in the case of Crystal Blaze it was only a matter of time before they were found, plus Shu and the others couldn’t move anywhere because Sophia was turning into glass.

And I must say, that Sophia’s death was really built up well, and it turned out really touching. The second episode then wasted no time to give us a small gunfight, and I must say that it was quite an interesting idea to fool the enemy’s night-vision by turning up the heat to body-temperature. I’m not sure whether this actually works in real life as well, but it’s an interesting idea. On top of that, Akira’s gotten shot in his shoulder. With only three episodes left, I’m really curious to see where this one is planning to end.

Soul Eater – 09

by psgels, posted in Soul Eater


After the rather serious previous episodes, we finally get another comedy-episode, in which the strange fairy-like creature of the OP gets introduced. It turns out to be Excalibur, with a head so full of himself that it makes even Black Star sick. This episode was downright hilarious, with many thanks to the wonderful combination of Death the Kid and Black Star.

One thing I’m wondering: we see Black Star read an English comic in this episode, and yet he had huge problems with reading the word “Excalibur”. Small writer’s mistake?

In any case, what I’d like to see in the next couple of episodes is more about Tsubaki. For the past number of episodes, all she did was watch from the side-lines, do nothing, and clean. I’d love to see her in a situation where the writers make fun of her personality.

Porfy no Nagai Tabi – 22

by psgels, posted in Porfy no Nagai Tabi


God, this series is such a breath of fresh air in the genre of travelling anime. Never have I seen a series that puts more emphasis on the people that you can randomly meet during a journey. This series isn’t gut-wrenchingly sad anymore, but it’s still awesome to watch, simply because it’s such a joy to see the different people that Porfy runs into.

The episode starts with Porfy, boarding the next train, along with a couple of other passengers, among with is a spunky rude girl. Porfy ends up finding a seat close to her, next to an old couple. He starts talking with the couple, and the girl overhears him saying how he’s come from Simitra, and it turns out that the news of the earthquake that happened there even hit the shores of Italy. The old woman gives Porfy one of her sandwiches, as the train enters a tunnel. As this is the first time Porfy’s been in one, he’s startled by it.

At the next station the old couple leaves and they say goodbye to Porfy. Porfy then falls asleep and has a nightmare about Mina, when he’s woken up by the girl from before, noting that the train has reached its final destination, and that they need to change trains. She and Porfy spend some time together as they both wait for the train to arrive, and they get to know each other a bit better. The girl’s 13 years old and her name is Daisy. She’s been living with her grandmother, and is now travelling to her father.

They also ask around a bit, and Porfy one of the people in a pub seems to have heard of Roma, and tells how she and her companions have been travelling from town to town. Porfy is yet again scared when a train comes but doesn’t stop. Daisy makes fun of him because he doesn’t even know that that was a supply-train. As the real train is about to arrive, they notice a local musician who’s singing a bit.

They go and sit together in the train, and he turns out to be a student of the music academy. Ever since he was small, he’s loved singing, and now he’s trying to become a professional. He’s travelling in order to meet his girlfriend, whom he hasn’t seen for a long while due to his studies. He plays some card games with Daisy and Porfy, until Daisy meets her father and has to leave. Porfy then suddenly realizes how awful it is to say goodbye, since it happened too with his parents.

When it’s time for the musician (whose name is Maximilian, by the way) to leave the train, he offers to take Porfy with him, and help him search for Mina in his hometown. Porfy accepts. Maximilian’s girlfriend Iralia greets them at the station, and drives them to their home. Obviously, Porfy can’t help but say how he loves cars. Maximilian obviously finds it a bit strange for a station called “Patagos Grand Station” to only have two people working on it. 😛

Along the way, they drive past a large mansion; through one of the windows Porfy recognizes a girl who looks a lot like Mina (this’ll probably be important in the next episode). They then arrive at Maximilian’s home, and they’re greeted by Iralia’s parents and three dogs. The dogs can hardly leave Porfy alone, and for the first time since losing his parents, Porfy has the feeling of being in a family again, and the episode ends.

I must say, that even though the regular animation was a bit dodgy at times, the backgrounds looked better than ever! It’s so apparent that the creators spent so much time on them to make them as diverse and life-like as possible, and the result is absolutely gorgeous.

Kara no Kyoukai – The Garden of Sinners – 01 Review – 82/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews, Kara no Kyoukai


Ah, I finally got the chance to watch this one. If I recall correctly, The Garden of Sinners 01 is the first part of a series of seven movies, based on short stories by the creators of Fate/Stay Night and Tsukihime, produced by the Ufotable that did Manabi Straight and Tales of Symphonia. After watching the 45-minute long first part, I’m eager for the next ones, because It had quite a few good points.

It’s rare to see a mystery-movie nowadays, since most of them focus on either action or drama. The Garden of Sinners deals with the topic of suicide and adds a supernatural touch to it, and the result works quite well. A lot of effort has gone into the dialogue, and it ends up meaningful and thought-provoking, but the real highlight of this movie is without a doubt the gorgeous graphics. Ufotable received a big budget to work with, and they knew exactly how to use it. Yuki Kajiura’s soundtrack may not be among the best of her work, but it still manages to make The Garden of Sinners into a feast for the senses.

The storytelling is a bit sloppy, though. We hardly learn anything about the main characters: where did Shiki’s l33t-powers come from? How did the boy lose his consciousness? How did Shiki lose her arm? What kind of job does she do anyway? Why is she the only one who goes after the string of suicides? All questions that remain unanswered, and I hope that the next movies will at least answer the most basic ones, and give some much-needed background to the characters. At this point, I found it hard to sympathize with them, because I knew hardly anything about them.

And there is of course the matter of Haagen Dasz. The pizza hut references in Code Geass and Darker than Black is one thing, but these commercials always knew how to stay in the background. In the Garden of Sinners, a bunch of pointless scenes are wasted, simply because they only focus on a bunch of packs of Haagen Dasz.

Still, overall this movie made good use of its limited time to deliver a solid enough mystery-story. Now let’s see what the other movies will have in store.

Baccano! – 16

by psgels, posted in Baccano!


Okay, so this episode turned out to be miles away from the action-packed finale that I imagined for this show. In total, there was just one fighting-scene. In exchange, the writers managed to deliver an ending that was more complete that I could have imagined. Everyone apart from the dead people, Lua, the Gandors and the Runoratas makes an appearance, and everyone’s story gets a decent closure. It’s been so long since the series finished, but this is indeed why I fell in love with the original series.

Not only the threads from the past two dvd-episodes were wrapped up, but also the various story-threads that were left behind by the series:
– The reason why Rachel freaked out so much when Rail Tracer whispered something in her ear: this turned out to be “Ticket Inspection”. Apparently, Rachel’s hobby was stow-awaying on trains. 😛
– The wish that Herman asked to the demon was to make him a human and watch over Maiza, until he’d laugh again. That really was the first time I noticed that guy, but I do remember having seen him a bunch of times. Did Maiza never wonder why the guy would never age, just like he did?
– Sylvie also ended up taking the immortality potion, a few years after she boarded the boat.
– The mouse is just fine, and is still happily living.

As for other highlights: Rail Tracer is also just like a little kid when he’s not on a killing-spree, Ladd has turned insane and Dallas seems to have escaped within the two-year period that he was trapped inside that concrete. His whereabouts and Ladd’s storyline are the only real questions that this series has left behind, aside from the obvious “how will the characters spend the rest of their immortal lives?”

The only disappointing thing is that we never saw anything of Lua. She’s overall been the weakest major character in this series. Heck, I’m still not sure why she got her own place in the OP while the people from for example the information office did not. The scenes with Firo, Isaac and Miria also were pure fanservice-moments: none of them had any role left in this series, so the creators gave them their own little moments where they just have fun. Ah well, at least it was fun. 🙂

Thinking back, Baccano has been a wonderful anime. Series without a clear main character do have their charms, because in this way, you won’t have to deal with an annoying lead that needs to stay in the centre of attention, even at the cost of some plot-devices (this is also why I’m a fan of series that know when to put their main characters in the background, in favour of the side-characters).

Nijuu Mensou no Musume – 07

by psgels, posted in Nijuu Mensou no Musume


In case you were wondering: yes, there indeed was no Nijuu Mensou no Musume last week. The creators sure chose the most annoying time, after episode 6’s huge cliff-hanger. Still, I’m glad that this series is back now, because this episode was really worth it. It wastes no time in developing the storyline further.

As it turns out: her two future comrades are an annoying classmate and the maid of Chiko’s mother. As it turns out, Chiko goes back to her family in this episode after the loss of Nijuu Mensou. The creators also waste no time in placing hints that Nijuu Mensou might be alive somewhere, like many people already suspected.

The mood of this episode got rather ruined when Chiko started speaking English, however. Another item has been added to the list of “things Hirano Aya can’t do”: speak proper English. Even compared to the English skills of your average voice-actor, it was horrible. I think that’s why her voice fits Chiko so well: it’s soft and subtle. Hirano’s problem is that she wants to show off way too much. It may give her lots of awards, but quality is something else. What I’ve heard of her in Zettai Karen Children and Haruhi Suzumiya in particular was unimpressive and more annoying than it was enjoyable.

In any case, I really like how the new cast of characters isn’t as one-sided as the old one. It’s really varied, there are lots of different parties with their own intentions and backgrounds. This should prove to be very interesting for the future of this series.

…but what was up with that giant robot?

Amatsuki – 09

by psgels, posted in Amatsuki


This post is going to be short, as I have a slight headache right now. I swear to god, Amatsuki isn’t the right series to watch with a headache. This episode in particular introduced a character who could give Holon from Real Drive a run for her money in terms of elaborate monologues.

This episode continues to build up the Fox-demon arc. Toki and Kuchiha get more information about the state of things from the above-mentioned guy (it seems that Bonten is after the princess’s life). The thing that stood out obviously was Amatsuki’s trademark style of storytelling: first it’s all bright and light-hearted, until the fox demon suddenly brutally kills Heihachi while Tsuyukusa just watches her do it and doesn’t even try to help the guy.

May Summary

by psgels, posted in Monthly Summaries

I noticed that this season, there are a lot of really good 13-episode series. Much more than usual. This trend seems to become more and more popular. In some cases, it’s unfortunate, because some series would be able to show their potential even more with 26 episodes.

#23 (16) – Allison to Lillia – (6,9/10) – Ugh, what a disappointment. In this month, the continuous amount of hard-to-take-seriously plot twists has destroyed my suspense of disbelief. A few errors in storytelling are okay, but in my opinion, Allison to Lillia is way too lazy in this.
#22 (12) – Persona – Trinity Soul – (7,6/10) – Persona is overplaying the traumatic parents way too much. Heck, did any of these teenagers grow up in a normal way? It’s a shame, but this series still feels like it’s missing something, and I doubt that the finale will be good enough to make up for this…
#21 (25) – Code Geass – Lelouch of the Rebelion – (7,7/10) – I’m finding it hard to force myself to not take this show seriously (why did nobody in the Britannian army for example get the idea of intercepting Lelouch’s phone-calls? How the heck did Lelouch collect 2 million zero-suits?), but Gode Geass is still good enough mindless entertainment.
#20 (11) – Blassreiter – (7,8/10) – Blassreiter: stay away from emo! The action scenes are still amazing, but the amount of emo-scenes has been getting out of hand now. Emo-distorted faces do NOT make a good anime.
#19 (15) – Wagaya no Oinarisama – (7,9/10) – The dialogue is surprisingly hard to understand, so I switched to the subs for this series. The episode about the main character’s love interest was really pointless, but apart from that Wagaya no Oinarisama has been enjoyable.
#18 (21) – Toshokan Sensou – (8,1/10) – I can’t help but thinking that Toshokan Sensou could have been better if it focused more on its plot, though it still can make up for this if the first half was just a simple build-up and it finishes with a strong finale.
#17 (13) – Macross Frontier – (8,1/10) – Macross has mostly been strange fluff this month, though the one action-episode that was included was pretty entertaining.
#16 (18) – Vampire Knight – (8,2/10) – Now I know what this series reminds me off: this is basically just the shoujo-version of Mushiuta. They also share the same strengths and weaknesses: both are solid and have a continuous melancholic atmosphere, and both hardly have any moment where characters are not angsting: so far, Vampire Knight has been all about angst angst angst angst, and nothing else. Angst can be great, but it shouldn’t take up the central focus in an anime!
#15 (23) – Chi’s Sweet Home – (8,2/10) – It’s getting a bit predictable here and there, but overall this turned into such a charming series. Much better than I originally expected.
#14 (17) – Soul Eater – (8,3/10) – It’s not deep, it’s not anything special, but it is fun, charming and it manages to keep my interest. Let’s hope things stay that way.
#13 (24) – Junjo Romantica – (8,4/10) – Well what do you know? Junjo Romantica is actually pretty good: it’s got a great sense of humour and it knows how to develop a romantic relationship. Seriously, I’m a bit baffled to say this, but a lot of straight romance shows can learn something from this series. :S
#12 (22) – Druaga no Tou – (8,4/10) – This turned out to be a surprise: it knows exactly how much it should take itself seriously. It’s not pure silliness, which would leave no room for a storyline, and it’s also not pure seriousness, as that would be rather hard to take seriously, considering the male lead and all. Thumbs up for Gonzo.
#11 (10) – Nijuu Mensou no Musume – (8,6/10) – Well, I think that episode six says it all. The beginning of this series was a bit buggy, though Nijuu Mensou no Musume has been getting better and better

#10 (9) – Itazura na Kiss – (8,8/10)

Excellent shoujo romance. I especially loved the end of episode 7.

#9 (8) – Kurenai – (8,8/10)

This was probably the quietest month for Kurenai, but it’s turned out to be a lot of fun. The characters are deep, and episode 6 was downright hilarious.

#8 (6) – RD Sennou Chousashitsu – (8,9/10)

Okay, so what if RD has turned out to be the opposite of what I expected. It’s fun, intriguing, varied, and clearly building up to something and I’m dying to know what that is.

#7 (7) – Crystal Blaze – (9/10)

Solid plot, both the main characters and villains are fleshed out well enough, great storytelling that doesn’t waste a single scene, great use of music, sympathetic characters. What more could you wish for? Great example of a great low-budget series.

#6 (14) – Gintama – (9/10)

And we’ve entered another serious arc of Gintama, and as usual with arcs like these: the quality increases drastically, and one moment will have you crying with laughter while the other will have you on the edge of your seat. Oh, and Kagura is the best hostage ever.

#5 (4) – xxxHolic – (9/10)

The different random stories on xxxHolic have been excellent so far. This is exactly why I’ve fallen in love with the first season.

#4 (5) – Amatsuki – (9/10)

I’m still not sure what it is with this show, but the dialogue has been incredibly well written so far, even though I only understand 60% of it.

#3 (3) – Himitsu ~The Revelation~ – (9,2/10)

This series is masterful in terms of storytelling I’m still not sure exactly how, but every episode feels complete once it forces you to see the big picture at the end. This becomes all to apparent when the more disturbing roots of the series come to surface (episode eight!)

#2 (1) – Porfy no Nagai Tabi – (9,2/10)

And so Porfy has started travelling. This series continues to be innovative, and it makes every single person Porfy runs into count. Such amazing attention to detail.

#1 (2) – Kaiba – (9,5/10)

Kaiba was simply incredible. A master in storytelling was clearly at work here.

FREEDOM – 06

by psgels, posted in FREEDOM


Tamaya!

*erhem* sorry, but I couldn’t resist. This episode had so many Ooedo Rocket-vibes. Heck, you could nearly say that this is Ooedo Rocket, condensed into just one episode, with the samurais removed, it’s almost scary to see how many similarities there are. And still it doesn’t feel like one of the two ripped off the other.

Seeing as I loved Ooedo Rocket, there’s no surprise that this was probably my favourite FREEDOM episode up till now. This episode had everything: fun characters, a great storyline of trying to create the rocket, a bit of background on why Ao was the one on the picture that Takeru found (her father once tried to go to the moon as well, but he failed. Ao was forced to forget everything that happened, and so she started to get really involved in the local space program). Blue Earth was of course the Akai of Ooedo Rocket. In this case, he was supposed to go to the moon along with Ao’s father, but chickened out at the last moment.

One point of criticism: it hardly feels like two and a half year have passed by. Characters still look the same, which is especially suspicious since we’re dealing with a bunch of teenagers here. I really wonder whether Freedom can pull off a good finale. Heck, what kind of finale is it going for anyway? At any case, I do hope that the creators won’t go for something too epic, especially since Freedom has been so delightfully down-to-earth up till now.

This episode also reminded me of why I love Yoshihiro Ike’s soundtracks so much. To be honest, he’s my favourite musician, along with Yuki Kajiura. Yoko Kanno’s work is excellent, but in my opinion she’s not the best.