xxxHolic – 22 – Temptation

by psgels, posted in xxxHolic


Another Watanuki-centred episode. And a quite touching one as well. I love the theme they used for this episode. The case is like this: Yuuko is away on some mission, leaving Watanuki alone. He then runs into a strange woman, and the two become friends. Very soon, they find out about each other that Watanuki lost his parents while the woman lost her son. It’s easy to figure that both start caring for each other. Every time his school finishes, Watanuki meets up with the woman.

The great thing is that there’s something fishy about this woman. After a while, she starts to give Watanuki a strange cold-like illness. It starts with a few innocent coughs, though very soon he faints while in PE, and the episode ends with him, phoning Yuuko, coughing up blood and collapsing. It must be really hard to believe that someone you care about actually is making you horribly sick. Especially in Watanuki’s case. He’s finally found someone who can understand him, though now it seems that he’ll have to cut ties with her. That was the great thing about this episode.

Watanuki and Himawari also spent a lot of time together during this episode. Without Domeki, for once, as he’s busy preparing for an archery tournament. It’s quite interesting to see. Especially seeing that Watanuki’s silly behaviour greatly entertains Himawari. So far, this is the second two-episode arc in xxxHolic, and I’m wondering what else will happen in order to be able to cover for another episode like this. It’ll definitely be interesting.

The Third – 16 – Kanwei and the Desert Fairy

by psgels, posted in The Third


Another fine episode. Not as good as the previous two, but enjoyable nonetheless. During this episode, Honoka recovers again, tracks down Leon and defeats him. Kanwei, meanwhile, merges with the desert fairy and Millie learns a bit more about how to support Honoka.

Now that the Leon-arc ended, I wonder what’ll happen afterwards. We still have one character left to be introduced, so I suspect that the next arc will be focusing at this woman. But what will happen afterwards? Also, it doesn’t seem that Kanwei’s story has been fully explored yet, so I think we’ll see a bit more of him in the future. I wonder if we could say the same thing about Gravestone. Also, what role will Paife and Joey be playing in the end?

I really like the battles in The Third. It really tries to explain why characters act the way they do, instead of just some flashy graphics. The battles feel a lot more natural this way, contributing to the awesomeness. It’s something not a lot of anime are attempting.

Simoun – 25 – One More To Go!

by psgels, posted in Simoun


Ooh, that was so exciting. After seeing this episode, it seems that the creators are planning to go all out for the final episode, while they used the last couple of episodes as preparations. I still have no idea what’s going to happen. Okay, Aaeru and Neviriru will be performing the Emerald Ri Maajon. But what will happen afterwards? Will they meet with Limone and Dominüra or Amuria? And what may have happened with Mamiina’s corpse which was blown out of the air a couple of episodes ago?

In any case, final episodes are always tricky to perform the right way. Many anime have trouble with this, and only a handful managed to do it in the end. I’m hoping that Simoun will be one of those. In any case, it won’t be one of those rushed endings, as it’s had enough time to prepare. Let’s hope that it’ll be able to deliver.

Anyway, about the episode. We start where we left off after the previous episode: Paraietta, Furoe, Aruti, Kaimu, Vyüra, Morinasu and Rödoreamon entering the spring. This is surprisingly painful for Yun, as we see her in agony once the ritual starts. (On a side-note: the background tune they used for this worked perfectly). The results are quite interesting.

Kaimu: Female
Vyüra: Male
Furoe: Male
Paraietta: Female
Aruti: Female
Rödoreamon: Female
Morinasu: Female

Especially Morinasu, Furoe and Paraietta are surprising. Both Furoe and Morinasu were seen, claiming to become the opposite of what they actually became. I think love had a lot to do with this. And Paraietta so seemed the type to become male. Everyone just assumed that she’d choose this. It’s also interesting if you realize that they aren’t priestesses any more. Especially when they saw a little kid, coming up to them and praying in front of them, just like nothing happened.

The second part of the episode basically features getting Aaeru and Neviriru in a Simoun. For some reason, the Plumbum officials are insisting that they go to the spring as soon as possible. In the end, with a bit of help from everyone, they manage to do this. Aaeru and Neviriru say goodbye and the episode ends.

.Hack//Roots – 23 – Surprise, an actually good episode

by psgels, posted in .Hack//Roots


I can’t believe how incredibly strong the music worked in this episode. Finally .Hack//Roots understands how to use its music again. It played almost constantly through the entire episode, with some very intense and very fitting tunes. Especially at the times at which characters were feeling heavy emotions as well, it worked great. Finally we have another enjoyable episode of .Hack//Roots.

Basically, all of the PK-ers are planning to lure him into a trap and attack him head on, all at once. When they attempt to execute this plan, however, it seems that Haseo’s able to defeat them without any problems. The Meatball Brigade also has its own problems. Or the Paw Brigade, the Paw Squad, or however you may call it. Ah well, it doesn’t matter anyway, as they break up in the end and Tabby’s alone again. Especially the moment of break-up worked great with the music.

Saburou, meanwhile, spent the episode looking at Haseo’s killing fest, preventing some PK-ers to sneak off and buy revival items. She’s interested in Haseo, but what’s her objective? Phyllo, meanwhile, continues to worry about Haseo and has a very amusing interaction with his cat. One of the few signs that there actually is an outside world. He also sends Touta to find out who first got the idea of ganging up against Haseo, and it seems that it’s an overconfident bunch of PK-ers, who hope to kill Haseo after he slayed more than 100 PK-ers. They’ll be famous. Yata and Pai seem to be members of the “Ravens”. It’s probably some weird hacking cult. They’re somehow related to the .hackers, whoever they may be.

Seriously, there are two series, currently about to end and from which I’m so hoping for another sequel in order to wrap things up: Higurashi no Naku Koro ni and .Hack//Roots. In both cases, it’s almost impossible to come with a decent finish, as both will end horribly unfinished as it is now.

Binbou Shimai Monogatari Review – 63/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews


Binbou Shimai Monogatari is your typical slice-of-life series. Kyou and Asu are two sisters. Their mother died when Asu was born, while their father ran away and left a huge debt. This means that they’ve been living most of their lives together. And that’s basically it. The ten episodes of this anime basically follow these two girls, as they live their daily life.

While it definitely isn’t anything special, I have to give this series credit for being the first slice-of-life show to actually catch my interest. The fact that the girls are alone didn’t only make them independent, it also made them very emotional towards each other. The two girls love each other, but at the same time, they worry about each other way too much, which makes sure for a couple of very cute scenes.

The anime certainly has a few very cute moments. There are some light attempts at comedy which really contribute to these scenes. It’s also one of the few series in which the different eye-catches are very amusing. The character designs look very good, and both sisters look very cute. Still, the fact remains that this is a slice-of-life series. During the majority of the airtime, it’s just boring. It also contains a couple of moments which don’t really make any sense, with the most notable one being an extremely rich girl who insists on buying all kinds of bargains.

Overall, it had its cute moments, but Binbou Shimai Monogatari will never be anything memorable. Only check out this series if you are really, really bored.

Narutaru Review – 88/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews


You hear a lot of things about Narutaru. It’s supposed to be sick, disgusting and disturbing. I decided to check this out for myself, and I actually found that these supposedly “horrific scenes” were pretty awesome. I can really say that I enjoyed this anime. It’s not perfect though, but I’ll get to that later.

The story: while on holiday at her grandparents’, Shiina runs into a strange star-shaped animal, with some very strange powers. When she returns, it becomes clear that there’ve been more children who ran into similar creatures. A majority of these children are alienated from society. When the anime progresses, it becomes clear that some of these children use their creature in order to kill others.

The story starts out very light-hearted, and turns darker as the episodes progress, and so does the level of disturbing material. At episode eight, the first major climax of the anime arrives. Afterwards, the story suddenly takes a huge leap towards a totally different focus. This continues up to the thirteenth episode, which finishes the series with a great ending.

The thing I love about this anime is the huge number of disturbing footage which is shown. And especially the reaction this has on the different characters. Seeing that most of the characters are just young kids, the shock of experiencing those kinds of things becomes huge, and Narutaru does a very fine job in portraying this. Whether the characters get angry, sad, or scared, all of this was portrayed in a really awesome way. I can really say that I had a great time watching this anime. Especially the episodes with lots of pain and suffering were awesome.

Still, the fact remains that Narutaru is an anime which could easily have been expanded to 24 or 26 episodes. It definitely has enough material for this, and it would have made this series a lot better. That’s because right now, the creators had to stuff this series into only 13 episodes. Some anime try this by having a huge pacing. Narutaru tried this by just omitting a lot of scenes. The result is that it introduces lots of questions, but only focuses at a select few of them, ignoring all of the others, leaving them entirely unanswered. For example, we see one of the bad guys preparing for some kind of plan, but then he suddenly entirely disappears from the screen. We never see any trace of him. And there are many more examples like these. Still, the points at which Narutaru did decide to focus on worked out great. ^^

Overall, it’s a very nice anime. If you like disturbing anime, you seriously should consider to check this one out. I had a great time watching this. It’s just that I wish there was more of it.

The Third – 15 – OMG Honoka O_o

by psgels, posted in The Third


Seriously. This was an amazing episode! I can’t believe that the creators would go this far, at this stage of the anime.

Okay, so Honoka got mortally wounded. That by itself already was amazing. It’s clear that she’ll recover somehow, as we haven’t reached. But why was I so hoping for her to be safe? Why did I keep wanting her not to die. If an anime manages to do this with me, it seriously has done something special.

Okay, a quick summary. The episode starts rather gloomy, when it seems that Millie still keeps her feelings inside of her. Ever since the previous episode, Bogie has been travelling for three days. During those three days, Millie only smiled once. And that’s when she managed to hit a can with the gun she got from Honoka. Then, they reach the sandstorm with the desert fairy in it, as well as Kanwei and Leon. Leon starts shooting at Kanwei, after which Honoka runs up to him and the two end up in a fight. Honoka looks to be winning, though then Leon blasts two small lasers through her body, and she faints. Ikus takes her back to Bogie, and there it seems that even his healing powers aren’t enough. In the end, all hope is left on Kanwei, who also dropped by.

There’s also a bit of info given about the fairy and Leon. The fairy seems to be called Star Seed. She’s the seed of life, which seems to be spread over the entire universe. Within her, all the genetic data of all living beings is stored. She seems to be travelling all kinds of worlds, collecting DNA, in order to transport lives from here to some kind of newborn planet. I think that she uses the DNA from those she saves in the desert as guidelines. Leon seems to be a phantom, made out of liquid metal. Usually, these phantoms have degenerated into pieces of nothing, though nano-machines make them smart. Phantoms also can absorb each other, in order to become smarter and stronger. It seems that Leon’s absorbed quite a few other phantoms.

The highlight of this episode definitely was the reaction of Ikus, Millie and Bogie to Honoka’s wounds. Millie really was too sad when she found out about this. And especially Bogie surprised me. He always is as objective as possible. But when Kanwei starts doing strange things with Honoka, he suddenly starts yelling, telling someone to stop the wolf. Especially if you consider that he’s actually just AI. In any case, this was a wonderful episode. I won’t be surprised if The Third ends up as the best series of the spring season.

Otogi Juushi Akazukin – 12 – Things you wouldn’t expect from a children’s show

by psgels, posted in Otogi Juushi Akazukin


This episode’s main purpose was to introduce a number of new characters. The problem is that their relationships are quite complex. If you combine this with my lack of Japanese, things become quite hard to understand. This episode also was pretty dark, with themes you wouldn’t expect in a children’s anime. The bad guys are no longer the only ones who get slain. Something I never saw coming.

Anyway, a quick rundown of the new characters.

First, we have a strange villager, carrying an accordion. We see him at the beginning of the episode, where he discovers some strange eyes, glowing out an abandoned building. Later in the episode, he warns Souta not to go inside that building, as a monster is wandering around in its wine cellar. I’m not sure whether he’s an important character, or just appeared during this episode. At first looks, he just was a random villager who ran into the monster in the wine cellar, but then again, why did he carry an accordion? And why did he have to act so mysterious (as in, randomly disappearing without a trace)?

Second, a new bad guy. The one with only a single eye. We see him for the first time when he talks to Randagio. He seems to be his superior, or something. His name is spoken, but it’s even harder to figure out how to spell it than with the Bremen City Musicians. I’ll go with Rarudo for now, even though it’s a rather strange name. In any case, he looks quite scary.

Third, another bad guy. He appears along with Rarudo. It seems that his name is Jedo, though for some reason, he wants Randagio to call him “Eternal King Jedo-Sama”. The conversation that he and Rarudo have with Randagio could also mean that Eternal King Jedo-Sama is another major bad guy, who wasn’t present at that time. Otherwise, the guy would be speaking about himself in third person.

The fourth is a character who only appears this episode, seeing as he disappears afterwards. He’s a monster who lives in the wine cellar at the abandoned house, mentioned above. He’s able to take the form of a human, and when Souta meets him, he learns that he isn’t a monster after all. It’s just that he’s become lonely after everyone labelled him as a monster and stayed away from him.

The fifth is the strangest of the bunch. I’m not really sure what he’s up to. He seems to have come to town to slay the monster in the cellar, but he acts nice towards Souta when he finally did so. When Baru found out that the two of them have met, he suddenly got extremely serious. For some reason, the monster names Jedo’s name as well when he’s about to get killed.

I’m not sure who belongs to which party, but it’s great to see that this is not just a fight between good and evil. We have Souta’s side, we have the side of the Bremen City Musicians, we have Cendrillion’s side and now Jedo’s side has also appeared. And why does Randagio seem to have connections with each of the last three of them?

In any case, Randagio was pretty funny during this episode, when he tried to get his hands on the key yet another time. The Nightmarians he summoned were quite creative as well. Instead of summoning one huge creature, he summons a bunch of flees. ^^ Quite annoying if you have no idea how to deal with them. During the end of the episode, he also has a very funny discussion with Cendrillion. She tries to say something to him, but because he’s forced to keep such a large distance from her mirror, he can’t hear what she says. ^^ I love it when he gives the more serious characters a funny side.

Oh, and Raikan, that was the person who was with Cendrillion in episode 10, wasn’t it? *kicks memory*

Night Head Genesis – 08 – Ah, So That’s Shouko’s Power

by psgels, posted in Night Head Genesis


An episode focused on the main plot of the anime, instead of an individual case. A bit less awesome than usual, though. There wasn’t enough pain and suffering, unfortunately.

In any case, a few things about Shouko become clear. It seems that she’s at a warp which connects the entire world. No time and no space exist where she is. This has showed her things she needs to know. Still, it also seems that she doesn’t know everything. She doesn’t know what the “Upheaval” means. it does seem that she left some messages for the two brothers in Miki’s care. Their memories about their parents aren’t false. And she shows them the strange scriptures she was reading in episode one.

Naoto and Naoya seem to have a very strange power. The power to change reality. Much details aren’t known yet, though it does seem that people will be trying to take advantage of them. At the end of the episode, we also get to see another psychic, who seems to have another vision-ability. I think he can see alternative futures, or something in that direction. In any case, he sees a future in which Naoto and Naoya have killed the entire world population. He’ll probably be coming after them soon.

A strange tattooed man also appeared during this episode. I’m not sure what his purpose was, or who sent him, though it did seem that he was trying to profit from the brothers’ sorrow. He makes Naoto and Naoya see that they seem to have more abilities than they thought they had. He wasn’t really interesting, though. Just an overconfident bastard.

xxxHolic – 21 – Watch Out For Giant Scissors

by psgels, posted in xxxHolic


I’ve got one problem with this episode. The case this time is focused on Watanuki, instead of a customer. The episode is about superstitions. At one time, Watanuki’s clipping his toenails, after having heard that you can’t clip your toenails at night, because if you do, you won’t be with your parents when they die. His parents are dead, so he ignores this. Because of this, he gets attacked by a giant pair of scissors.

Well, the problem I have lies with Yuuko’s explanation. The people who came up with these superstitions were trying to prevent people from doing something. They knew you’d be attacked by a giant pair of scissors if you clipped your toenails at night, that’s why they subtly tried to warn others. But that doesn’t make any sense, as why is Japan the only country who believes in this? If this really were true, rumours and stories like these would appear over the entire world.

But now that I think about it… the scissors could also have been Yuuko, who tried to make Watanuki believe in superstitions.

Watanuki basically had it right: there is no such thing as superstitions. When you believe in things like these, you start paying attention to the details. For example, when you break a mirror. Every time you have bad luck, you notice it, and blame it on the mirror. Tons of good things may have happened, but you don’t even notice these. You just keep focusing too much on the bad parts that you loose your view of the overall picture. Most of the superstitions work like these, and that’s also the reason people are still believing in them.

I think that this episode was just one big attempt of Yuuko, trying to play with Watanuki’s mind. First of all, Watanuki never turned into a cow. His body just got heavy. I think indigestion problems can be blamed. His obsession with Himawari’s ribbon was just something psychological. He already was a bit ill, so he couldn’t concentrate on things properly. He then focused his eyes at Himawari (logical, as he has an eye on her), and concentrated on the most attention-catching aspect: her ribbons. His mind, meanwhile, told him that he was a cow, and for some reason, he began to think that cows chase after red, moving things. He probably was at the point at which he began confusing cows with bulls. And at the beginning of the episode, at which Watanuki tripped over his own shoelaces was also some good timing by Yuuko. She just made him forget about tying them, which can easily result in him tripping over them.

Still, Watanuki’s story about how the death of his parents made him stop believing in superstitions really was touching. He also reached a nice conclusion. It’s always nice to believe in them, as long as they’re fun. Overall, the episode was nice, but frankly, it dealt with a theme which has been a bit too much overused (that, or I just watched way too many American cartoons when I was young).