Dead Leaves Review – 71/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews


After Mind Game, it seemed a good opportunity to check out another infamously absurd movie: Dead Leaves. It’s interesting to compare the two of them. Both movies are as far away from normal as possible, both are just crazy, both have their own good points, and both have their own bad points.

Let me issue a warning before I continue: Dead Leaves is absolutely not meant for little children. It can and will have a bad influence on them. The entire movie basically is a senseless violence-fest, with lots of maniacal gunfights and explosions whose purpose seems only to entertain the viewer. There’s also a huge dose of foul language in this, so keep this away from your little brother and sister.

One of the most notable differences between Mind Game and Dead Leaves was the fact that while Mind Game had its moment in which the pacing was very slow, Dead Leaves absolutely does NOT have these. The pacing is huge from beginning to end. Especially if you combine this with a couple of hyperactive characters, you’re in for a huge roller-coaster ride.

The story’s like this. A man and women wake up somewhere, unable to remember anything. They’re naked and decide to rob a store, with lots of violence and gunfights. After a huge car chase, they get caught by the police and end up in a mutant prison on the moon. In there, they discover that in this prison, pretty gruesome things happen. Over the course of the anime, some pretty interesting plot twists occur. Overall, it’s a pretty creative story. The main characters are an interesting bunch. We have a hyperactive man with a television as head and a very tough, sarcastic woman. They really are very funny at times. There wasn’t really any point at which I found them annoying.

Still, Dead Leaves does have its bad points. Unlike Mind Game it has some predictable points. Okay, some events are impossible to predict, but during some scenes, you only have to wait for the inevitable to happen. The character art also differs from normal anime. It’s a bit messy. It looks interesting at times, some characters have really creative designs (the television guy, some of the goons. These really looked evil when they wanted to). Other characters, however, look just plain. Another strange thing I noticed was that near the end, the overall animation quality suddenly got bogged down.

The major bad part of Dead Leaves was its infinite amount of action. Gunfights can be very entertaining at times, though a series has to know its limits. Dead Leaves doesn’t. Most of the times, we see people shooting as much bullets at each other until one of them dies. After the twentieth time, this gets rather annoying. The mindless killing also really got on my nerves at times, as they didn’t really add anything new.

Overall, like Mind Game, dead leaves was a very nice watch at times. Some scenes were very creative and amusing to see. Other scenes, however, ruined the movie a bit. Still, if you’re some kind of action or foul language junk, you’ll probably love this.

The Third – 14 – And The Art is Back To Normal ^^

by psgels, posted in The Third


Ooh, this really was an excellent episode. I always felt that the Gravestone arc, although it was awesome to see, it lacked something. And now I know what: Millie. Still, right now I’m fearing that the current arc will lack Paife. =P

In any case, during this episode it really becomes clear that Millie is only trying to be strong and independent. When Honoka starts treating her as if she needed help, she gets angry at her. She runs away and almost gets caught by a Hangeki (a huge sand-trap desert monster). If it wasn’t for the desert fairy, the wolf (Kanwei) and Honoka, she would have died back then. That only makes Honoka realize that she didn’t even try to understand Millie. It’s exaggerated, but it delivers some awesome results as well.

The best part of the episode definitely was when Millie forgets about being strong and starts crying, while clinging to Honoka. She was so sad and cute at that moment. (notice her red eyelids when she’s asleep afterwards?) If these scenes keep up, The Third will definitely get an incredible second half. I’m trying not to take The Third’s awesomeness for granted, though (*coughHackRootscough*). Still, The Third already has made a huge impression on me. The creators have to do very strange things in order to screw up and make me hate this series.

The plot seems to go in the direction of the wolf, the fairy and the desert eater. So far, it sounds very interesting. Who was this girl next ot the wolf? Why is it searching for the desert fairy? What is a desert fairy anyway? Why does it act the way it does? Why is the desert eater after it?

Overall, The Third is awesome, and with this episode, the awesomeness only increased.

Popolocrois 2003 – 13 – Recap

by psgels, posted in Popolocrois 2003


Recap. Luna reflects what happened in the past episodes (with a bit of help of Punpun and Kotarou). You could say that this episode marks the ending of the first half, and the beginning of the second half.

Ever since the previous episode, Luna has been unable to return to her human form. Pinon has been busy with his homework and Marco has been busy with mother, I think. That’s why she’s getting kindof lonely. Then, Pinon asks Ulala (who was as funny as usual this episode) to deliver her the message that he’ll be seeing her again. During the end of the episode, they have a happy reunion.

Still, this episode did contain a few bits of new information. Luna lived in some kind of castle, but she had a fight with her mother and ran away. It also seems that she couldn’t go ashore at all costs. Otherwise she’d meet the same fate as when Narcia goes to the sea.

Still, the most interesting moment happened right before the end of the episode, in which Luna reveals quite some interesting things. She wished to be human again, to have a second golden key. Though she shouldn’t have wished that, as the Law of the Moon would be broken by this.

What exactly is going to happen in the next episodes?

Higurashi no Naku Koro ni – 23 – Awesomeness

by psgels, posted in Higurashi no Naku Koro ni


You know? That actually was a pretty awesome episode. After its incredibly weak fifth arc, the sixth arc definitely brings this show back at its original level of high quality. This episode definitely contained some of the best moments in Higurashi.

Still, nothing much regarding the main plot directly happens. Rena kills Rina and Satoko’s uncle, Keiichi, Mion Rika and Satoko find out about this and decide to fully support her. They clean up the bodies afterwards. We then switch to the Watanagashi, in which Oishi smiles with an evil grin and the episode ends. This is all very important to the storyline of the sixth arc, but except for a new perspective on Satoshi, the main story stayed away again during this episode…

…unless you start looking at the changes in personality for each of the characters. Especially Keiichi shows some interesting signs. He was kindof unique in the first arc. In that arc, the disease really got to him and he started doubting his friend, and he ended up killing them. During the second arc, however, we see that he’s suddenly become extremely nice. This continues up to the third and fifth arc, and now as well, in the sixth arc. He just does everything in order to protect his friends. I think it’s because of his history, being bullied and all. He finally made some good friends, and didn’t want to lose them. But what caused him to freak out in the first arc?

Now that I mention it, there’ve been more characters who had one arc in which their personality was totally different if you compare them with the other arcs. In some cases in two of these arcs. Satoko, for example. In arc 3 she shows a totally different side than the ones she showed in arc 1, 2 and 6. The fifth arc lies a bit in between, I think. Rika also acts differently in arc 4 and 5 if you compare it to arc 1, 2 and 3. The different arcs lead to different personalities of the different characters. what causes this?

Anyway, back to Satoshi. When we saw the body at the beginning of the third arc, I began to look for possible victims. It either was Keiichi or Satoshi, though I chose for Satoshi, seeing the things he went through. Now, I’ve been notified that this assumption is totally wrong. It was Rina. (Notice the star tattoo on the corpse?) If that’s the case, what the heck happened to Satoshi?

Regarding that, I’m going back to a theory I got during the first and second arc (if I remember it correctly): Satoshi still being alive. He was saving money for something. He killed his aunt and ran away, using that money. Probably because he wanted to protect Satoko, though he couldn’t face her after what he did. Rika also didn’t mention his name on the list of people to die during the fourth arc, suggesting that he didn’t die at that day. This is even more confirmed by Mion, at the end of the fifth arc, in which she confesses that she never knew anything about Satoshi, and nobody from the village killed him.

The flaws in this theory:
– We still have Tomitake.
– Why didn’t Satoshi kill his uncle? He’d seem worse than his aunt…
– Where the heck is Satoshi right now?

Oh, I almost forgot. We also get to hear a bit of background we didn’t know yet. The garbage dump seems to be the construction site of the dam. The first murder also was supposed to be committed here. And along with one of the culprits, one body part of the victim seems to be missing. Hmm, I wonder where it went.

Another thing I’m wondering: did Rena kill Rina in the previous arcs as well? Could that be the reason she freaks out at times? Because she didn’t have Keiichi and the others near her, who accepted and supported her, even though they knew what she did? Could this be linked to the third arc, when Keiichi killed Satoko’s uncle, after which he found out that he didn’t kill the guy? Could it be Rena’s work? After all, she did tell him she was going for a bit of treasure hunting.

I’m very interested to see what the last three episodes will be about. This episode already proved to be awesome. How will Rena react to all of this? What material will be presented?

Oh, and one more thing: when will the Higurashi OVA be announced?

Mind Game Review – 72/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews


Mind Game has been on my to-watch list for quite some time now, as it was both produced by Studio 4C and I heard good recommendations about it. Well, now that I’ve seen it, what do I get? Well… good question!

I’m not sure how to describe Mind Game. The closest I can think of is Robinson Crusoë who’s been smoking dangerous stuff. This really is one of the more absurd movies I’ve seen. Even Eikyuu Kazoku seems like an ordinary walk in terms of strangeness. We’ve got a guy, who’s much like a loser. He’s got a girl he likes, he confessed to her, though he keeps getting too scared to take initiative. Until she gets a new boyfriend. So far it’s normal, though this is where every possible connection with the word “normal” ends. The main character, the girl and her new boyfriend sit the restaurant of the girl’s family. A very dangerous guy comes in and starts causing trouble. He then sees our main character, who can’t move out of fear, and he kills him.

Our main character then has a talk with god, after which he starts to freak out because of his own foolish mistakes. He runs away from god and turns back to life. In there, he kills the guy who killed him and runs away with the girl and her sister. In the end, they end up in the belly of a huge whale, along with a strange old man. That’s where most of the story takes place, believe it or not.

I’ve got a hate/love relationship with this absurdness. On one side, there are times at which it really works. We get to see a very creative car chase, and the characters work good with all of the chaos which bursts out of nowhere. At other times, however, the show gets a bit annoying. We often get to see useless fanservice, and some chaotic scenes drag on for a bit too long. I believe that this movie could’ve been more successful if it had been trimmed down to the length of one hour, instead of the 1 hour and 40 minutes it has now.

The graphics are again drawn in the typical style of Studio 4C. Still, for some reason, it didn’t really appeal to me in the way Mahou Shoujotai, Eikyuu Kazoku, Beyond and Comedy did. The animation, then again, shows that this is a big budgeted movie. Overall, it looks pretty creative and fluid. Something you can expect of a normal movie. The background art, however, is where this movie does excel. Things look as creative as ever, though Studio 4C has always been excellent in this department.

Overall, it was a nice watch, but it was definitely not Studio 4C’s best work. I’m suggesting you to check out Mahou Shoujotai, Eikyuu Kazoku and Comedy if you are trying to see some of their stuff. Still, I have to admit. The beginning of the movie, aka before they got into the whale’s belly was worth the watch.

Night Head Genesis – 07 – Children’s Grudges

by psgels, posted in Night Head Genesis


Even though the coincidence is a bit too obvious, I still love the way Night Head Genesis introduces its cases. Every case Naoto and Naoya run into is somehow linked to its previous case. The killer woman was in the pub. The suicides all happened near the place Naoto and Naoya grew up. The culprit behind these suicides happens to be Shouko’s little brother. As so little anime are attempting this, the effect that this gives is great.

In any case, like I said, the culprit was Shouko’s little brother. He seems to have the power of mind control, which he used to kill off the bikers who killed his dog and ran away. Quite a shock for such a little boy. When such a thing happens to ordinary children, they start screaming and yelling. But what if a kid has potentially killing powers? Right. Then things get out of control. Still, it worked perfectly. The boy was so sad in this.

His mother also plays an interesting role in this. She knew about her son’s power, though she just let him do what he wanted. It’s indeed the depth of a mother’s love. Though I wonder why she hasn’t discovered Shouko’s power yet. It may be that because of Shouko’s disappearance, she allowed her son to kill off those students. She was too scared to lose him as well.

The teacher, coach and popular girl also were very nice. The teacher was on good terms with the students. When she realized that she was being used to kill them off, she got cornered. As she couldn’t do anything, I think the least she could do was put their pictures on her altar, as a means of paying them respect. The popular girl actually was in love with Megumi, the first girl who died. She probably kept chasing after the boys because she was scared of being found out. And the coach was uninvolved as well. He was just a horny coach. Nothing more.

The Third – 13 – Just Ignore the Horrible Art. ;)

by psgels, posted in The Third


Ah, so this was the infamous thirteenth episode. And indeed. The character art is horrible. It seems like we’re dealing with totally different persons now. That’s what you get when you let different animation studios handle different episodes. Once, you run into a garbage one, which ruins an episode. Ah well, let’s hope the creators noticed this as well, and decide to cut all ties with it.

In any case, I am SO glad that the fansubs of the Third are finally starting to come out at a fair speed. Thanks a lot to FnT, for bringing us this wonderful series. This episode actually was pretty good, if you ignore the horrible art (which is what I’m going to do right now). Ever since the previous episode, Honoka has been taking random jobs, like working as the bodyguard for a couple of scientists. Under pressure of Joey, she decides to take a vacation. Ikus and Millie will be joining her.

Two new characters appear during this episode. A strange man, who appears to be a desert eater, hunting for a desert fairy and not afraid to kill others. He should prove to be an interesting antagonist for later. The second character is a strange desert wolf, who appears for a few seconds. Why do I know he’s an important character? Because of the new ED. In there, you see a picture with all the important characters, among with the scary guy and the grey wolf stand. Apart from that, we have a strange mecha. I suppose that’s blue breaker. The desert fairy also appears, which suggests that we’ll get to see one of them soon. Gravestone also is visible, but there’s one character I don’t recognize. We see a strange woman, with long, tied up hair, looking at a certain direction. I wonder who that might be.

It was great to see Honoka, busy with her daily life again. Some pretty funny moments also happened during this episode. The desert punks talking, for example. Or when Ikus, Millie and Honoka were talking about skirts. She really is an awesome character if you look at it that way.

I’ve also taken a look at the preview for next week. The art is as good as it’s used to be, and by the looks of it, it’s promising to be an amazing episode. I really can’t wait! Millie really does add an extra bit of awesomeness to The Third. Especially during this episode, it becomes clear that her father’s death has left a huge scar on her.

Simoun – 24 – Not as I thought it would go. But awesome nonetheless!

by psgels, posted in Simoun


Okay, that was deep.

This episode went so incredibly deep. It’s so different from the direction I hoped for, but that doesn’t mean that I didn’t love it.

The major part of this episode deals with the fact that the Chor Tempest will be disbanded, which means that its members will have to go to the spring, which means that they’ll have to say goodbye to their previous lives. Topics like these always do well, so you’d wonder why so little anime are trying it. In any case, every member, except Aaeru, Neviriru and Yun, will be going to the spring. The way the creators displayed this was awesome. On their last day, they all have just a last bit of fun, before they leave. Kaimu and Aruti also get a bit closer together, and Paraietta was scratching something on the wall near the dormitories. We don’t get to see what exactly it was that she scribbled on it, though.

Aaeru and Neviriru stay on the Arcus Prima, however. Both still are unsure which sex they should choose, and Neviriru keeps bugging Aaeru to do the Emerald Ri Maajon. This eventually ends in Neviriru confessing to Aaeru. I think the two now officially are in love with this. We get to see the results at the next episode. ^^

Yun gets a very surprising role. Remember her during the previous episode? She keeps getting haunted by what she saw. In the end, she decides to leave the Arcus Prima, and accept Onashia, and forgive her for the sins she committed when she didn’t choose a sex, wishing to stay an eternal maiden forever. Onashia then disappears, while Yun takes over her role. The other members of the Chor Tempest find this out in a very interesting way.

Seriously, I never expected that the creators were going for an ending of this kind. You would expect a lot of action, though for the previous two episodes, there hasn’t been any fight scene at all. And due to the fact that peace has been made, I don’t think more action scenes will be coming. At first, I was a bit startled by this, though now I’m beginning to see how incredibly awesome it can become. We still have the problem of Limone and Dominüra. What will their role be in the final two episodes?

Popolocrois 2003 – 12 – Jan! Ken! Pon!

by psgels, posted in Popolocrois 2003


Haha! The best episode so far. Papu finally reveals his reasons for coming, the Seirei of Darkness is beaten and Luna comes with a very nice twist in the end. It’s like this: Papu really is the Seirei of the Moon. He’s the Seirei, overseeing all other Seirei. This explains why the Wind and Fire Seirei got so startled when they saw him. It’s always scary to see a superior coming without notice.

In any case, Pinon uses the power of the moon, combined with his own power in order to beat Yasm in Phantonesia. By doing this, however, Papu is forced to return to the moon while he transports Pinon, Luna and Marco to the normal world again, giving Luna the tip that her pendant is made from the power of the moon, thus able to defeat the darkness. The catch: it breaks. This makes Luna unable to retain her human form.

That is a very interesting development indeed. For the latter half of the series, we’ll be seeing Luna in her true, beautiful though different form. I’m not sure whether Papu comes back. At the end of the episode, we see him return to the temple, but I’m not sure whether that is a dream or not. I guess I’ll have to wait till the next episode to find out.

The second half of the episode shows quite a few very funny moments. The most memorable definitely was the Jankenpon. Punpun and Kotoro were funnier than ever during this episode. It’s indeed quite pitiful to be playing Jankenpon with a robot who only can do scissors. Kotoro also began to look more and more like his father a bit later in the episode, in which he has *cough* “trouble” while fixing his giant-crab-machine-thing. Punpun, meanwhile, shows that she accepted that Pinon has an eye for Luna, by helping the two get closer to each other. An interesting development, at this stage of the series.

Other funny moments include when we see the cook bake eggs in a very quirky way, with Pinon noticing the results afterwards and Lulu who messes up with her magic once more, turning Pinon in a very cute kitten. ^^;

Last big revelation: we get to see the one who named Yasm. The real bad guy in this series. Or bad girl in our case. It seems to be some kind of demon, sealed away and hoping that Yasm would free her.

Ergo Proxy – 20 – Two People in One Body

by psgels, posted in Ergo Proxy


This episode’s Proxy has the ability to delude someone’s mind. You could describe it as bringing its victim in a dream-world. In this dream world, The Usagi has arrived in Romdeau, after which Real turned Vincent in and hid Pino away. Afterwards, she was taken in by Daedalus and his assistant: Swan, in order to become a perfect citizen again. Vincent, meanwhile, turned into Ergo Proxy and was locked up. Real, meanwhile, felt bad for betraying Vincent, so she created an alternative Vincent in her subconscious mind.

The Real Vincent gets to be this alternative Vincent, while the Proxy gets to be Swan. Over the course of the episode, Swan tries to make him believe that he needs to kill Real. She tries to make him believe certain lies about his subconsciousness. I’m not sure what her goal was in doing this. I think that, if this continued on for much longer, Vincent’s mind would break, or something, allowing her to defeat him.

Swan also shows Vincent a bit of his past. In this, Real and Daedalus are brother and sister, Vincent works as the Chief of the Civil Guard with Raul as his subordinate and Vincent and Real who are about to marry. Obviously, this isn’t how it really went. But I wonder if there’s some sort of truth in this. After all, Vincent remembered a few details on his own, before this sequence started (the cup falling and Real cutting her finger on it). Of course, this could also have been the Proxy, trying to play with Vincent’s mind, creating the events so that in both cases, Vincent would naturally act the same way, thus creating a deja vú.

In order to confuse Vincent, Swan creates an illusion, within an illusion. But it makes you wonder what’ll happen once they actually reach Romdeau. The Proxy also made a few mistakes. Pino suddenly looked fancy again. Vincent didn’t know about the new Real, so there also was no new Real in the illusion. For some reason, Swan also gave herself and Vincent the two pendants. Proxy is able to move so fast, why can’t he dodge bullets like that? And why didn’t Real look for Monad? Still, it was a very nice attempt at fooling him.

While an interesting watch, this episode wasn’t really anything special. It was just another Proxy, playing mind games with Vincent. I think the bad thing was that this Proxy didn’t really have well-defined rules. Proxies like in episode 14, 15 and 19 all had certain rules they had to follow, which made these episodes very enjoyable.