Short Synopsis: Lief, Barda and Jasmine run into one of Tegan’s guards. Surprisingly, he uses riddles.
Good: Kree; Great to see enemies actually using riddles in a show of this nature.
Bad: Rather incompetent fansubbers; the guardian could have used a bit more background.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 7.5/10
With this episode, I think it’ll be obvious why I decided to switch to the subbed versions. Seriously, I can follow what’s going on on the screen decently, but when an enemy actually uses word games and riddles, then it’s a definite sign for me that this isn’t an anime that I can watch raw. This anime also makes use of a number of very specific explanations, and without full understanding of what’s going on, it’s going to be hard to enjoy this anime to its fullest.
It’s just too bad that the fansubbers seem to either have insufficient English knowledge, or they just don’t know enough Japanese, as the translations are far from accurate. I wouldn’t be surprised if the lack of background from the guardian is because they missed a few details. Either that, or there’s some explanation about how he suddenly changed back to normal later in the anime. But ah well, you’ve at least to give them credit for trying, and subbing this anime in the first place. 😉
Anyway, I liked Kree’s back-story in this. The reason Jasmine was so reluctant to go to the lake was because of Tegan. The witch used to kill its entire family in her web (suggesting that she’s some kind of spider), and certain events in the episode suggested that she has no respect for animals whatsoever. Because of this, she sends him back to the forest. I still find her reason to join Lief and Barda a bit weak, though.]]>
Saiunkoku Monogatari – 34
Short Synopsis: The new head of the Sa Clan has been chosen. Seiran, meanwhile shows how determined he is to get Sakujun out of the way.
Good: The game between Seiran and Sakujun.
Bad: To be honest, I expected Kokujun’s craziness to have a larger impact.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8/10
The major part of the episode focused on the new head of the Sa-clan. Ensei and Eigetsu attend the meeting, while Shunki and Shuurei free Kokujun. It’s a pity he didn’t really turn crazy and followed Enjun’s example. In the end, Shunki talked him out of it by forcing him to take up the position of head of the Sa-Clan. Him, in combination with Shunki and Eiki will prove to be a good head of the clan, while the other stuffed-up bastards who have been causing so many troubles to the Sa-Province have been pushed back.
Still, the really interesting part of the episode came with Seiran and Sakujun. In the end, Seiran desperately wants to put an end to Sakujun. We still don’t really know what caused all his grief in the period he spent with the Satsujinzoku, but he’s seeing Sakujun as a huge threat to Shuurei because of it. He’s even willing to wage his own life to mere luck, in order to get rid of him. And then still it’s a matter of 50% chance of success. The next episode will probably focus on this little game of them, which really makes me look forward to it.
It’s interesting, with this, there are still five episodes left of the first season. I wonder what kind of ending the creators are having in mind. For only five episodes remaining, just having Sakujun as an antagonist probably won’t be enough to provide a challenge to Shuurei. There will probably be time devoted for Shuurei to get used to her position of the governor of the Sa Clan, but that’s not what you’d consider a climax, would you?]]>
Bakumatsu Kikansetsu Irohanihoheto – 22
Short Synopsis: Kakunojou finally performs in a play again. Akizuki meanwhile catches up with Enomoto and Soutetsu carries on with his own plans.
Good: Great climax, excellent episode.
Bad: The episode started a bit slow, perhaps.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8/10
Ah, you could call this episode the beginning of the ending. First of all, Akizuki manages to return, in an attempt to cut down the head once again, instead of sealing it. Soutetsu brings Kakunojou to the scene of fighting, and she once again protects Enomoto from being harmed by Akizuki. With this, Soutetsu hoped that he could show her that she needs to guide Akizuki, in order for his mission to succeed. After Akizuki retreated, he tells her this in person. I’m still not sure what he’s after. Apparently, he wants something to happen between Akizuki’s sword and the lord’s head. but what woould be worth going through so much trouble, just for that?
The supporters of the new government (at least, I assume it was them) also arrived in Hakodate during this episode. Their first attack failed, due to the clash between Akizuki and Kakunojou, but they’ll probably be back for a second attempts. I wonder what they’ve still got to add to the storyline. The Englishmen, by the way, also returned at the end of the episode. They’re probably assigned to stop the Lord’s Head at all costs, but I suspect that there’s also a great desire of revenge in them, for what happened with Rook. Especially Queen should have quite a grudge.
Tetsunosuke (that was his name, wasn’t it), meanwhile, start to develop feelings for Kakunojou. I’m not sure why the creators suddenly decided to introduce another love rival for her at this point of the anime. I mean, they’ve already got a huge story, why introduce yet another love-triangle which will probably end up either useless or forced?
Anyway, I really liked Kakunojou’s play. I’m not yet sure what it was meant to symbolize, but it definitely made her think about her mission.]]>
FREEDOM – 02
Short Synopsis: Earth has become completely uninhabitable due to the fall of a huge space station down the atmosphere. At least, that’s what people want the citizens of Eden to believe.
Good: The ending of the episode.
Bad: Okay, it wasn’t too realistic, though.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8/10
Ah, why not. I’m going to blog this OVA. It’s only coming out once a season, and it could definitely use a bit of extra attention, as the setting is really interesting so far. I like how this anime uses the technique of cell-shading. It definitely works as an art style, though the creators still haven’t figured out how to synchronize mouth movement properly apparently.
This anime basically tells two stories: that of Takeru and his surroundings, his friends and his rivals, and his search for the mysterious girl in the picture. The first part may be nice and all, but what really caught my interest was the second part, ever since the ending of the previous episode. Me likes the mystery. This episode basically shows Takeru, trying to find the girl on the picture, and eventually discovering that she’s from earth. For some reason, however, the authorities of Eden are determined to keep this a secret from their citizens.
I loved the ending of this episode. Okay, it’s a bit overglorified, only when Takeru climbs a not-so-large mountain, he sees the earth very clearly, instead of on the horizon, and he just happens to run into the messages from earth, but I’m willing to forgive this to the creators. It seems this anime is going to focus on Takeru, as he tries to go against the government of Eden and return to earth. It’ll be interesting to see what happens in the end. So far, there are a lot of bad OVA’s around here, but FREEDOM definitely is worth watching.]]>
Red Garden – 19
Short Synopsis: This episode develops lots of relationships: the one between Kate and Paula, Rose and her father, Claire and her brother and Rachel and Luke.
Good: Kate.
Bad: No bad points this time.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8.5/10
Whoa! The next paragraph will be a major spoiler for the next episode, so if you haven’t seen it yet, close this window NOW, if you don’t want to be spoiled. I accidentally noticed Impz talking about it in IRC, and I just have to confirm whether it’s true or not.
I was lurking a bit in #animeblogger, and then I noticed Impz mentioning that the creators of Red Garden aren’t afraid to kill off a major character for the progression of the story. Afterwards, I tried to forget it, but OMG, are the creators really planning to kill of Kate!? Seriously, she could have been considered the main character of this show. Of all the four girls, she got involved with the main storyline the fastest, and it was her that Hervé started dating. And now she’s just going to die like that? Okay, I don’t know if it’s really true, but the ending of the episode sent some really big hints. O_o
Regarding deaths, Neil also died! To make things even sadder, this makes his only reason in this anime to be killing off Kate. To make things even more complicated, the head-officer died so that Neil could die, so that Kate could die. It’s like a domino-effect! Are the creators going to keep this up until they kill off every single character of the cast? It would be disturbing, but seeing that there are still 7 episodes left, I’m feeling that lots of characters are going to die in the next couple of episodes. O_o
Also, regarding the main part of the episode, that one was meant to develop the different girls even more than they already were. And guess what, the predictions I made in the first half of the series for both Rachel and Kate were way off. Luke comes back, and even after dating Amanda he still loves Rachel. It’s not Luke who dumps Rachel, it’s Rachel who dumps Luke. Paula also was never in trouble because of Rachel’s bad attendance. She was in trouble because she kept worrying about Kate. She knew everything, and she even loved her (at least I had that part correct). The scene between Paula and Kate was too sad, by the way.
Claire was just adorable. She’s become rather spaced-out, after the previous episode. On top of that, she finds out that her father has actually been helping her brother. Rose, meanwhile, develops a cold during the episode. Fairly predictable, but right now, she’s getting even closer to her father.]]>
Death Note – 21
Short Synopsis: A Misa-episode. See what happens when the other idiot acts on her own.
Good: Finally the plot moves along a bit faster. And finally Misa gets a bit useful again.
Bad: Still, Misa remains annoying. Just as Light and the non-Kira members of the Yotsuba-group.
Overall Enjoyment Value: 7.5/10
Finally we see Rem again. The mystery of the third Death Note also has been solved with this. Instead of a third Death God descending down to earth, we have Rem, who went to the Yotsuba-group. In there, she told the current holder of the Death Note about Misa being the second Kira, though this person appeared to be a complete bastard with the same intentions of Kira-Light: kill Misa after using her. This time, however, she can’t blackmail him for some strange reason. Most probably, this reason is Light.
In the end, everything is one big scheme, thought out by Light. Right now, he’s fooling L completely. He sent Rem to the Yotsuba-group, and right now he’s just waiting for the right opportuned moment in which he’ll regain his memory, and probably kill L at the same time. I wish that moment would hurry up.
Misa also made one annoyingly huge mistake when she showed the conversation of her with Higuchi: taking L lightly. From the outside, wouldn’t it have been strange for Misa to just know and pick out the right Kira? After all, if she would have chosen the wrong Kira, he would have reported it to the others. Also, how is she going to cover up for the death of that important CEO-guy? I mean, L can check this right away, and from this point, it’ll be easy to figure out the rest.
On a side-note, I like how Mochi finally got a personality this episode. He’s always been staying in the shadows, but now that Misa needs another manager, it looks like he’s finally getting some scenes of his own. Actually, in comparison to Matsuda, I kindof like him. He’s not as air-headed as Matsuda, he isn’t really good at acting, but still he wants to do his best. The result was pretty funny. ^^;]]>
Otogi Juushi Akazukin – 35
Short Synopsis: The introduction of the finale of Otogi Juushi Akazukin. Jedo returns, Cendrion takes Souta to her castle, and we get the final confirmation about Turude.
Good: Poor Randagio. In fact, poor Souta and Akazukin.
Bad: Ringo has become rather useless, hasn’t she?
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8/10
Wait, the guy is alive? Ah it doesn’t matter, as he dies this episode for real this time. In a quite interesting way, though. Souta released his power, and he tried to take it all for himself. This, however, became too much for him and he dies, changed from the King of the Lycan to a mere slave of Cendrion. Now I also understand why Cendrion was so interested in the Lycan. Not because they were so strong or reliable, but they’d make some great Nightmarians.
On a less serious note, I loved it when Randagio offered his services to Cendrion and the eerie background music suddenly stopped. It just shows how useless he is. It’s interesting that Cendrion doesn’t just kill him. I wonder if he’ll still have some kind of role left. Same with Ringo. When will she stand in the spotlights again? She got quite some airtime during the first third of this series, but for the past number of episodes, she’s been just a bystander. It’s probably because all of the story didn’t have anything to do with her. That’s changed now, now that Souta has been kidnapped, so I’m expecting some action from her in the next episode.
It’s also interesting, the magic Souta released actually was dark magic, as opposed to the light magic we saw him release against Hansel. That’s probably Cendrion’s work. She’ll probably execute her plan in the next episode and be freed, while the later episodes will focus on sealing her back, and eventually destroying her. They’d better be awesome. ;)]]>
Otogi Juushi Akazukin – 34
Short Synopsis: A Hansel and Gretel-episode. I guess we all know what’s going to happen. ^_^
Bad: Ah, the cheese.
Good: Who cares about the cheese! The episode was damn awesome!!
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8.5/10
Ah, and this concludes the story for Hansel and Gretel. That leaves five more episodes to deal with Turude and Cendrion. Usually, you wouldn’t need so many episodes for just that, so I’m expecting a few nice twists here and there. ^_^ The episode itself also was totally awesome, as finally Gretel’s wishes come true. Cute! Cute! Cute!!!!
And as a special treat, we also learn how Gretel managed to actually handle that huge sword of hers: it’s because of her mittens. We already knew that she could use gravity-magic, but she actually can do that because of these things. It was in a desperate attempt to keep up with her brother, who kept getting stronger.
It’s interesting, the one of the reasons Otogi Juushi Akazukin has been so incredibly awesome is that it’s been closing lots of its major storylines. First the Jedo-arc met a closure, where Akazukin’s and Baru’s storyline finished. Then Bremen-tachi were removed, and Randagio’s storyline has finished. Now the past two episodes have been finishing the storyline of Hansel and Gretel. Ibara-Hime probably isn’t significant to the storyline, and I think that Shirayuki’s storyline was resolved when the bell was destroyed. That just leaves Souta, Turude, Souta’s Father, Cendrion and possibly Ringo. If I had to guess, then the next episode will be a Turude-one.
Awesomeness. ^_^]]>
Master of Epic – 09
Short Synopsis: We’ve all seen our shares of bald males, have we? But this really is the first time I saw bald FEMALES in anime.
Good: Ah, Master of Epic exactly how I like it, there were no overly long sketches, and each of the sketches was hilarious as usual. ^_^
Bad: ………main…..characterrrr…..
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8/10
Ah, another hilarious episode. A bit disturbing at times (the evil hairdresser O_o), but overall great fun, and with some great mecha and sentai-parodies. But still, that main character… She’s probably appeared in the largest amount of different sketches of all characters, but all she did was appear for one or two seconds, in order to disappear afterwards. I want to see her featured in a sketch, dammit!
Sketch 1: the introduction. This time, the announcers talk about changing your hair. Interestingly enough, they also visited a barbershop recently, who seemed to have cut their entire heads bald. Cute and disturbing at the same time.
Sketch 2: the party with the noob again. To think that the previous sketch was only a warning, as the group of four heads off to exterminate the great evil hairdresser, who gives all of them rather obscure and hilarious haircuts. In answer to this, they head out to defeat her with an ultimate tactic: shave your entire head bald. O_o Unfortunately, the great evil hairdresser not only can cut hair, she also can give it, so she leaves our four heroines with some rather interesting-looking afro-haircuts. O_o Definitely one of the weirdest sketches so far.
Sketch 3: Resurrection, part 3 (yeah, that’s what it really was called). We return to the guy we saw in episode four, who keeps goofing off in a rather hazardous place. This time, he sets up an explosive trap for the passing-by monsters, though he’s stupid enough to get caught himself.
Sketch 4: Trying to impress the hot Pandemos, part 2. We now see the same guy, working as a blacksmith when the same Pandemos he had a crush on a few episodes ago appears again. She behaves like nothing’s happening, though the guy was too cute. XD
Sketch 5: Resurrection, part 4. The guy is back in the mountains. His next plan: hand-to-hand combat. That doesn’t work. ^^;
Sketch 6: The radio-show. The host tries to tell another strong story, about how a necromancer and a magician are supposed to have been making out. The way he tries to sell his story to the other host was just hilarious. XD
Sketch 7: Waragecha V. I loved the parodies sentai-teams and their giant robots here. You often see that five small robots join together to form one big one, but still everyone fits inside the robot without any problems? Well, Warage Green has made her robot so that one person is actually in each of the limbs of the robot, as Warage Yellow sits in one of the legs, while Warage Blue has to pilot the mecha in one of its arms. Obviously, they won’t like it when it moves very fast. XD Warage Blue also was very cute in the beginning, when it seemed that she had to take on the producer all by her own because the others were slacking off. And no pictures please. XD
Sketch 8: Resurrection, part 5. The guy plants fire-bombs everywhere. That works, until a giant scorpion comes after him. XD
Sketch 9: Resurrection, part 6. The guy takes the initiative when he hears that the scorpion king is still roaming the neighbourhood. XD
Sketch 10: Chuu and Bukotsu. The episode ends very cute again with the antics of these two. Bukotsu is fighting a large number of monsters and Chuu tries to help him by giving him a healing-item. At least, that’s what he thinks. XD]]>
Ghost Hunt – 21
Short Synopsis: Before people get the chance to leave, Masako wanders off on her own.
Good: Mai! Finally! Urado; Finally we have an episode with an actual good combination of light and heavy scenes.
Bad: Why wasn’t Masako slaughtered immediately like all other victims?
Overall Enjoyment Value: 8/10
Ah, I’ve been waiting for this. Finally Mai has to be strong, in order to save Masako, who displays a weaker side of hers during this episode. Okay, she had to be saved in the end, but this was a good step in the right direction. I’m really hoping that similar situations will appear in the next episode and the final arc. All that’s left now is add an addictive pacing like in the fifth episode, and I’ll be really happy. 🙂
And dear god, Urado. He probably was the scariest ghost on Ghost Hunt yet, bathing in the blood of his tens, maybe hundreds of victims. I have no idea how the blood remained fresh after all these years, but the way he looked even beat the evil mother of the second arc. But why the heck didn’t he kill Masako as soon as he kidnapped her? After all, all the other victims were killed as soon as Urado transported them.
The next episode will probably serve as a final chance to flesh out the characters, while the final arc is probably meant to reveal the secret Naru, Masako and Lin share. We already know that Professor Davis is Naru’s father, but there’s more to this than just that. And please let John and Matsuzaki have at least sort of an important role. They’ve been really useless up till now.]]>