Good Witch of the West – 05 – Fanboy and Fangirl galore!

by psgels, posted in Good Witch of the West - Astraea Testament



We now continue with the fifth of thirteen episodes of Good Witch of the West. I was surprised at first when I found this number, as I assumed that there would be something along the lines of 24 episodes. Still, it does explain why the pacing has been so huge, it has less time than other anime to tell its story, so there’ll be no room for fillers. I’ll be curious about how this will turn out to be. So far, Good Witch of the West is heading in a very good direction.

The Secret-Garden arc ends here, its main goal was to introduce a number of important characters, the main villain among them, and to teach Firiel the things she needs to know about swordfighting. I’m not too happy about the skimpy outfits worn by some of the evil characters, a wrong decision by the creators. The plot twist was amazing. You knew it was coming some time, but at the time it finally comes, it’s totally unexpectable. It’s also very good to see that there’s another third party, who aims to oppose both the good and the evil side. It adds such a nice twist.

Sister Lain invites Roux over to her place again, Roux heads off, and Firiel finds the invitation letter on his desk. Naturally, she gets angry. At the meeting place, Roux gets greeted by the student council, along with Sister Lain herself. She then tries to seduce Roux, while attempting to make him talk about the Ephemeris. She then reveals that she oversees the Snake Rod (the ones that gave Roux his scars), and that she actually only lets them live because they might be useful to her. There was a lot of vague dialogue in this scene, so I didn’t manage to pick up everything. What I do know is that Lain is actually Leandra, Adale’s rival for queenship. She snuk into the Secret Garden for some kind of strange reason we still don’t know. Firiel reveals this, as she barges into the room, worried for Roux. Her argument is her inutition, something which surprises Leandra.

The two parties make a deal. As Roux needs to keep his manhood a secret, and Leandra wouldn’t profit from being found out, the two parties agree to keep each other’s secret. Leandra then puts a little extra stakes on the battle versus Ravenna: when Firiel wins, Roux won’t be harmed, when she loses, he’ll be Leandra’s posession. Roux is still absent-minded about thse things, and Firiel scolds him. It really seems that both of them are careless, in their own unique ways, and both of them need to remind each other that they are.

Anyway, this keeps haunting Firiel, and she begins to linger a bit during her training (at which she begins to have more and more fans and admirers, which is really awesome). Igraine tries to talk her out of it, though she doesn’t manage to do this for a hundred percent. Vincent then brings the news that the duel is only one night away. Igraine and Firiel spend the evening for a bit of very extensive training, which was supposed to make her ready for the swordfight. They do this in a special place in the academy, a very romantic one: a terrace, at a high place on the castle. After this training, Firiel promises to fight to her full extend. Roux also takes her to this place during the night, with the excuse of some shooting stars which will be able to be visible. This turns into a very romantic opportunity for the both of them. Another thing Good Witch of the West is extremely good at: the love-scenes. These will be great for every fangirl and fanboy, I totally love them.

Another interesting issue is that Ravenna actually gets a personality in this episode. She’s no more just an evil 1-dimensional character. This became clear first after the scene with her, Roux and Leandra. She just stood a bit helpless next to the two of them, unable to do something worthwile. The duel just increased this fact.

Anyway, the next day, it seems that someone has been sending Firiel some threat letters. She immediately suspects Leandra for doing that, though it appears that there’s another third party involved. Someone who’s against both Firiel and the student council.

Then the duel begins, and it’s awesome. First of all, it appears that Ravenna also got threat letters. Second of all: finally, we have fight again. Do you honestly think, that your first serious fight would be a piece of cake? Do you think that you’ll be able to give everything you have in order to win? No. Of course not. Everyone sucks at his or her first fight. I experienced this myself. I practice martial arts myself, and I entered a tournament once. In my opinion, pretty decent, but during that tournament my actions were totally horrible. Firiel is the same. Nerves take over, and she’s not able to do her best at all. She eventually manages to win because somebody in the audience uses a mirror in order to blind her, giving Firiel the chance she needs.

This brings up another interesting issue. When bad guys do this, it’s a dirty trick. The bad guys have to be punished, and nobody likes them. When a good guy cheats, everything seems to be allowed, just because the good guys are so awesome. You see that a lot in anime. Good Witch of the West gives a nice twist to this, but I’ll get to that later.

First, there comes the plot twist I talked about earlier. From the point that Firiel beat Ravenna, everything happened so fast, I really had trouble following everything. For starters: apparently, Firiel gets to be blessed by some kind of “princess”. First time I heard that. Anyway, the princess comes, and when she’s about to give her blessings, the princes grabs her own sword and throws Firiel to the ground. Remember Cisaria from episode three? Guess who this certain princess is. Cisaria then admits to have been the one to send all of the threatening letters, and the one who killed Roselitte. She then holds a monologue about her motives, ending in an attempt of suicide. Roux manages to stop her. These were a couple of amazing scenes. Especially the background, and use of scenery turned this into a feast for the senses, not to mention the twisted ideas of Cisaria, and the fact that Ravenna also is on her bad side.

Roux then reveals that he only came to this school because he wanted to stop the one after Firiel’s life. His mission is finished, so he prepares to leave. But not until Ravenna unleashes her anger upon him, by suspecting him to be the one with the mirror. To be honest, I also believed this in the first place. However, we never see who actually did it. It could’ve been someone totally different. But who? And why was this person so determined to go through such lengths in order to make Firiel win? Anyway, Roux gets unmasked as a boy, and he eventually manages to get saved by Adale, who appears to have been waiting for this duel in order to unassign the Student Council. This ends the Secret Garden-arc, Roux leaves in a way which will certainly please all of the fangirls out there, and we later see Firiel, Adale and Marie in a carriage, suggesting that Firiel’s abut to leave the academy as well. Leandra, meanwhile, isn’t too happy with Adale’s actions, and gets even more motivation to carry out her evil plans.

I’m pretty sure that this anime’ll reawaken my inner-fanboy. After all, this anime really seems to focus on fangirls/fanboys, rather than otaku’s (with the exception of Leandra, unfortunately). I currently totally love the art, it’s among the best ever. The dialogue may be a bit too vague, but it does work. Especially if you combine it with the incredible music which accompanies Good Witch of the West. The story hasn’t been amazing so far, though I’m pretty confident.

Jigoku Shoujo Review – 92/100

by psgels, posted in Anime Reviews, Jigoku Shoujo



The concept: somewhere on the net, there exists a website. When you access that website, you can enter the name of a person you want to take revenge on. This person then gets sent to hell immediately. There is a catch, however. When you die, you also get sent to hell. Your soul will never find peace, and it’ll burn forever. In some anime, concepts like these never work. Jigoku Shoujo, however, somehow manages to turn this into something awesome.

Each episode is a standalone episode, except for the latter ones. In each of these, a person wants revenge on another person, and struggles whether it’s worth it or not. While some of the cases may look like each other, the majority of these cases manage to produce a unique standalone story, with beautiful characters, beautiful motives and furthermore great storytelling. I especially liked episode 7, 16, 22 and 23.

The characters are amazing. Each of the main characters has a unique personality, a good background (in most cases great) and really adds to the story. There were no annoying main characters at all. The characters who only appeared for one episode, even though there were a lot of them, all had something different from each other, and each of them had some kind of background. At the end of each episode, we could really enter the mind of these characters.

The art looks amazing. Especially the character art is among the most crisp ever seen in anime. The music also has turned into a masterpiece. The storytelling also couldn’t have been done better.

Overall, Jigoku Shoujo is an amazing anime. I’ll definately recommend it to anyone. Although, I have to say that there were a number of episodes which didn’t really seem too impressive. Apart from that, I have no complaints about this series.

Final Rating: 92/100

Jigoku Shoujo – 26 – Ending

by psgels, posted in Jigoku Shoujo



And it’s over! The ending definately was interesting. It doesn’t belong to the collection of amazing endings, though I did enjoy it. A lot.

Especially the first half of the episode is worthwile. I’ll say it again: WARNING: HUGE SPOILERS AHEAD!

The spider! The spider was behind all this. He forced her to become Jigoku Shoujo, in order to repent for her sins. Anyway, Ai isn’t satisfied, as Hajime, who indeed is a descendant of Sentarou, hasn’t been sent to hell yet. She then uses Tsugumi, she gives her the black doll with the string, she shows her the accident at which her mother died and tries to make her paranoid. Tsugumi actually believes this.

Then the infamous scene occurs, at which Tsugumi’s saved by Hajime who enters just at the right time, but let’s ignore that, shall we? Hajime then finally begins to break down, and Tsugumi comforts him. A bit overdramatic, but it works. Tsugumi was too cute at this once more. Ai sees this, and she decides to cease hostilities. She takes a moment to destroy Sentarou’s temple, and she leaves, along with her dolls, in order to just play Jigoku Shoujo again. Like I said, it was nothing special, but I definately enjoyed this ending.

This also gives a lot of room for the second season of Jigoku Shoujo, which has been announced. There are a lot of unanswered questions left, like who the hell was the spider? What is the meaning of the candles, which get shown at the end of each episode? Where did the grandmother come from? And does Hell-boy make another appearance? I wonder whether Tsugumi and Hajime will continue to try and stop Ai. The tension concerning the three of them certainly has died, so there has to be something else to take their place, while the two of them get to play another part. In any case, I’ll definately be looking forward to the next season. Does anyone have an idea when it starts to air? The concept just so totally rocks.

Jigoku Shoujo – 25 – Amazing Flashback

by psgels, posted in Jigoku Shoujo



Like expected, this episode deals with Ai’s past. And holy god, it’s even better than the previous episode made it seem like. We start with the aftermath of the previous episode. (WARNING: HUGE SPOILERS COMING UP)

Ai goes berserk, and manages to hit Hajime and Tsugumi. The dolls try to stop her, but they fail. A huge lightning strike follows, demolishing a nearby tree, and sending Ai on the way to hell. She exits with saying that she doesn’t care about herself again. Hajime and Tsugumi, meanwhile, fall into a spring, and they enter Ai’s past. They get to see a vision of what turned Ai into Jigoku Shoujo.

Could it have been done better? I really don’t think so. Emna Ai really has the most awesome backgrounds ever, along with Ginko and Alice. For starters: Ai was being viewed as a monster back in her childhood-days. These ideas were based on total nonsense, but when an idea slips in, it isn’t possible to get it out of the villagers. Her only friend is Sentarou, and the two of them played together a lot. Sentarou protected Ai as much as he can, though he often loses his temper when she gets called names. Sentarou’s father also is a special person. He’s incredibly weak, so he can’t go and do work on farms. He volunteers to make straw slippers for the villagers in order to repay them. He also encourages Sentarou to play with Ai.

Then, Ai gets the message that she has to be the next victim in the ritual of Sending Seven, in order to appease the mountain god. Sentarou suspects that the villagers chose her on purpose, in order to get rid of her, which might actually come very close to the truth. They however, rely on their stubbornness and authority to ignore these facts. Sentarou gets even agrier when he hears this.

At the day of the Sending Seven, Ai’s parents come to Sentarou and beg him to help her. During the ritual, they hide her inside some kind of temple, and try to make the villagers think that she actually died. An interesting note: when Ai was picked up from her house, the ones who came to take her only thought about themselves, and acted impatiently. This shows that they really wanted her gone.

Anyway, the plan works, and for six years, Sentarou hides Ai in a well disguised place. He heads for her every night, and the two grow up together, and they begin to feel more and more for each other. Until one night, at which the villagers discover him, and the true awesomeness starts.

In these six years, the village has been dying. Harvests have been bad, and everyone’s complaining. When everyone finds out what happened, they immediately blame the cursed Ai for bringing misfortune to the village. Everyone demands the mistake to be corrected, by killing Ai once more. All they use are incredibly selfish arguments. Sentarou tries to do something, but none other than his father is the one who stops him from doing so. Ai gets chased and beaten down by the villagers, including them trying to drown her.

Later, both Ai as her parents have to be burried. They’re blindfolded, and all three of them get hit by a plough. When the villagers think they’re all dead, the bodies get thrown into a pit. Ai, however, remained alive, and she wakes up and sees hears Sentarou. Sentarou, however, is put under such enormous pressure, that he gets forced to be the one to burry her. Ai sees this, an then (while covered in blood by the way, an incredibly sad sight) she gets filled with hatred as the villagers finish filling the hole in which she lies with earth. Talk about horrifying scenes!

Anyway, a couple of years later, Ai arises from the earth, goes berserk and sets the village on fire. Sentarou sees this, and he flees. Tsugumi and Hajime wake up. Tsugumi doesn’t understand why Sentarou acted the way he did. Hajime, however, does. Does this have something to do with his former relationship? Anyway, as Hajime and Tsugumi didn’t get sent to hell, Ai hasn’t been finished either. We end the episode with her opening her eyes again, in a boat leading to hell.

Still, what role does the grandmother have? She hasn’t been shown at all during these flashback scenes. How did the dolls end up in hell in the first place? All questions, waiting to be answered in the last episode. The flashback was just amazing. This also explains what happened in the previous episode a bit better. Ai somehow seemed to have forgotten why she became Jigoku Shoujo in the first place, and thought that Hajime and Tsugumi could help her to understand this, and tell her what happened to Sentarou. The both of them are probably related to Sentarou in some way. The question remains: how?

Saiunkoku Monogatari – 07 – What’s up with the advisor?

by psgels, posted in Saiunkoku Monogatari



Some very interesting events happen this episode. We start with where we left off last week: Shiurei’s being tied down and Ryuuki’s about to walk into a trap. Ryuuki, however, noticed this in time, and manages to finish the assaulters off. Seiran, meanwhile, has a dream from the past, at which he was to comfort the young Ryuuki when he was fleeing from his brothers again. Shiurei’s father sees this and smiles, but dashes quickly as he hears footsteps running. Apparently, he doesn’t want to be found out, so he flees.

Ran Shiuei enters the door, and sees Seiran unconcious. He orders his soldiers to search the place, but nothing is found. Ryuuki, meanwhile, finds Shiurei, he unties her, and gives her a big, unexpected hug. She faints afterwards (after all, she does remain poisoned). Ryuuki freaks out. Koyu, meanwhile, gives a little rant about Kourin. Last episode, she wasn’t assaulted at all. She actually attempted to poison herself from doing such things to Shiurei. I’m beginning to like Kourin more and more. Can she get even more awesome?

When the doctors put an examination on both Seiran and Shiurei, it appears that Seiran will be fine. Shiurei’s a different story. There’s no antidote at all, and she’ll be in danger if something isn’t done. Ryuuki freaks out even more when he hears this. The advisor arrives, and the two hold a small conversation. I couldn’t really follow this, but at first, the advisor is reluctant to give out the antidote. After Ryuuki shouts to him, he gives it anyway, and Shiurei is saved. The strange thing is that this guy was smiling thoughout this talk. Why would he want to do that?

Ryuuki leaves and Shiurei’s father enters, and I was getting more and more questions about this advisor-guy. For some reason, he makes Shiurei’s father angry, though not to the point at which hostilities begin. The old man also gives a flashback of a strange man on a horse. Probably the former emperor. Some shots about the time during the fight of the sons of the emperor are also shown, with people barely being able to stay alive. I then realized that Shiurei’s father might be the scary guy mentioned in the fourth episode. He’s some kind of assassin, or something in that direction.

Shiurei, meanwhile, wakes up, and Ryuuki gives her another big hug. We then see Shiurei’s father once more, talking to Shiusui (the older servant of Shiurei), for some reason dressed in the same outfit as he does. She apparently is one of the few people who does know that he’s this scary guy, and the two hold some kind of conversation. Why do I get the feeling that this woman is Shiurei’s mother?

I really have NO friggin idea what’s up with the old guy. Just before, he was making both Ryuuki and Shouka (Shiurei’s father’s name) angry for some reason, and now he walks up to the culprit from last episode, and the two of them talk like they’re best friends. The culprit-old guy is dying from the wound he got from Seiran, and makes his way out of the castle in hope for a miracle. He then runs into the advisor-old guy, surrounded by two sparkles. He might possibly be one of the sages, mentioned in the beginning of the story. Anyway, he lights up, and changes into a twenty-year-old version of himself.

He then professes his LOVE for the other old guy, the other old guy takes his last breath. Apparently, they were really close in the past. I have no idea what that was about, but I want some answers!

We then switch to another very interesting development: Shiurei will be leaving the castle. Ryuuki’s got some sense into him, so she’s not needed anymore. During her departure, the advisor doesn’t show up (what is up with him?) and Ryuuki finally manages to confess to her. She, of course, immediately begins to yell at him.

I’m very curious about where this anime’ll go from now on. Ryuuki surely isn’t going to abandon Shiurei, but she doesn’t have to work at the castle anymore. Not to mention that we’ve only reached episode 6 of 39, so there’s got to be something to fill these following episodes. But what?

Higurashi no Naku Koro ni – 07 – A totally different Keiichi

by psgels, posted in Higurashi no Naku Koro ni



Woohoo, the show is getting awesome again. This episode was just full of unexpected and great plot-twists. Characters got a bit more fleshed out, and I still have trouble seeing Keiichi and Rena being so close to each other.

We start with the introduction of another character: the village chief. Okay, he never gets show on the screen, but it seems that he disappeared the day after the Watanagashi. Our fivesome discusses this event, Rena gets all giddly, and Shion (Mion?) looks away when he mentions Oyashiro-sama.

Keiichi still thinks about what happened during the Watanagashi, but then he runs into Rika. This is the first time she really got some scenes which centered around her. The two of them hold a very cryptic conversation. Rika knows what Keiichi did. Then Keiichi realizes that Rika knows what he did. Rika then sees that he realizes that she knows what he did. Keiichi then knows that she knows that he realizes that she knows what he did, and I can continue like this for a while longer. Rika, being the shrine maiden and all, decides to forgive and protect Keiichi. During this conversation, Rika rapidly switches from being scary to serious to cheerful. Overall, very nicely done. She also warns Keiichi in scary-mode about an elder sister, who is angry at her younger sister for committing an evil act. She probably means Mion and Shion with this. Mion appears to be very angry with Shion. (And we’ve seen her getting angry before ;))

Rika also mentiones a very interesting fact: there’ll be no more club meetings for a little while, as she wants to avoid the elder sister for a while. This really gives a different perspective to the arc, but I’ll get back to this later, as there’s an event which plays later in the episode which is connected to this statement of hers.

That evening, Shion calls Keiichi again. He apologizes, and she forgives him. She then begins to break down, as she tells him that it’s her fault that the village chief disappeared. She told him about what happened, and he disappeared afterwards. Keiichi then realizes that he did tell Rika about it. Nice plot twist, very nice plot twist indeed. He calls Rika’s house, but she doesn’t answer. He then contacts Rena, and the two of them run into Mion on their way to Rika’s house. Rena was being dead serious, for the first time ever not literally. I can’t say what’s scarier, when she takes the dead serious litterally, or when she doesn’t. Though, the fact remains that she was awesome at that time.

They arrive at Rika’s house. Apparently, she lives along with Satoko. Both of their parents died, so they have been taking care of themselves ever since. The doors are locked, Mion finds a ladder, Keiichi climbs it while looking for an open window and Rena goes to look somewhere for keys. When Rena’s gone, Mion enters Oyashiro-mode, and tells him that Satoko’s parents fell off the cliff because of Oyashiro, and her brother, the infamous Satoshi also disappeared. She shakes the ladder very brutally, though her mood completely disappears when Rena gets back with a couple of other villagers. I do have problems with this again. At that time, Mion was so badly animated, the scary part was almost gone, even though her face was in emo-mode again.

Still, it does bring up an interesting issue. Why does Oyashiro-Mion want to hide her mood in front of Rena? In the previous arc, the two of them got in emo-mode often at the same time. This probably means that Rena indeed has not been infected with Oyashiro’s curse. This also means that something must’ve happened for her to be infected in the previous arc. What would that have been? Does Keiichi play an unconcious role in this? And how did Mion get infected? And what did the “no blood” mean, which Mion kept repeating?

Another interesting fact I only realized after watching the episode once more: that night (exactly two nights after Watanagashi), there’s a full moon. It simply CAN NOT be a coincidence that there’s a full moon, right at that particular day. It absolutely can’t. It has to have some kind of meaning. Also, why wasn’t there a full moon on the most logical option: the night Watanagashi itself?

Anyway, inside Rika’s and Satoko’s house, Keiichi, Mion and Rena find some wrapped-up dishes and some finished cookings which haven’t been touched. Rena comes with her theories afterwards. But first, she actually COMFORTS Keiichi, who keeps blaming Rika’s disappearance to himself. I was a bit startled to see her so humane, but I absolutely loved that scene.

Anyway, Rena’s theory: Satoko bought some tofu at an old ladies’ that night. Tofu is used as the last ingredient of miso-soup, which was to be found on a large pot on the stove when Rena searched the room. This means that Rika was there, cooking, until right before dinner-time (apparently, dinner-time in Japan is at 19:00, instead of the usual 18:00), Satoko was getting the final tofu, because it appeared that they ran out. Because of the dishes which were wrapped up in the fridge, it becomes clear that something came up, which caused them to skip their dinner. This probably was right before dinner-time as well, otherwise, they wouldn’t have cooked. Rika probably noticed that they were out of soy sauce as well, so she went to some house, in order to borrow some. She then stayed there, for some reason, and when Satoko came home, she contacted her, ordering to come as well. The people at that house probably offered Rika and Satoko some dinner instead, making the dishes that Rika cooked obsolete. Satoko wrapped some of the dishes and went to Rika. Since then, they disappeared. This is quite impressive, though nothing mysterious comes from Rena. She all did this with the help of logic and common sense. I liked her even more after this.

They then run into Oishi, Rena leaves, and we see one of the most awesome scenes in the series. First of all: Oishi knows what Keiichi did on the night of the Watanagashi. Rumour have been spreading the morning afterwards. (who started these rumours, exactly?) Then the good part comes. Remember Shion? She’s been left outside of the spotlights this episode, in contrast to the previous one. It appears that she disappeared as well. Another scene that the creators managed to bring extremely well. It indeed seems like Keiichi didn’t see something that the other three did see. What could it be?

Another interesting fact which gets revealed is that Shion could’t have talked to the village chief, in order to confess her actions. Shion heard about the murders the morning after Watanagashi. At that time, the village chief was visiting a hospital in a far away place, to see a proctologist. On the way back, he was delayed because of a train accident, so he barely arrived in time for the shrine meeting, after which he disappered. Shion couldn’t have talked to him, unless it was after the meeting, which brings up very interesting discussions.

To close things, none other than Shion decides to give Keiichi a call. This is most obviously Mion, trying to imitate Shion, as she only confirms what Keiichi tells her, well acted. She also ends with the emo-laugh, and the episode closes. Well then, at which exact points did Shion pretend to be Mion, and Mion pretend to be Shion? The one with the ladder could’ve been the same Oyashiro-Mion from last arc, though it also could’ve been Shion who was infected with his curse (remember the first episode?). The first Shion, was that Mion again? Or really was that Shion. In any case, it would’ve been a different person than the one from the end of the second episode. You don’t forgive someone for yelling at you with such insults that fast.

This does mean that both Mion and Shion know what happened at the night of the Watanagashi, regardless of which one it was who entered the temple along with Keiichi. And at that time, when Shion disappeared and Mion appeared. Cos already mentioned that that could’ve been the same person. What was the other one doing at that time? And do Mion and Shion know about the switches of the others? And are they working together if they do?

Anyway, back to Rika. When you combine her story with Rena’s theory, it seems that Rika knew that she was going to disappear. Then why would she do it during dinner-time, unless if it was to set her own disappearance in scene? And what does Satoko have to do with this? In any case, Rika hasn’t disappeared entirely, as she still has to stab herself in front of the big sister. This makes us believe that the one in the emo-moods really was Mion after all, unless big sister means something different than age. And what exactly did make her stab herself anyway? She knew that it was going to happen, so she tried to run away. Though, unfortunately, the big sister will eventually find her at the end of the next episode.

Changes with the previous arc:
– Rika actually plays a big role.
– Rena’s not infected with Oyashiro-sama, and actually acts caring towards Keiichi.
– Oishi is much more suspicious.
– Mion (or Shion) is the one who tells Keiichi about Satoshi. Satosho also has no meaning at all in this arc.
– Rika and Satoko disappear/fake their own disappearance.
– Keiichi doesn’t get as paranoid as he did in the previous arc.
– Important: Keiichi actually cares about his friends. Something he didn’t show in the previous arc.
– Rika seems friendlier to Keiichi.
– Rena’s past is NEVER mentioned.
– The link between the main characters and the deaths/disappearances never gets mentioned.
– Keiichi’s parent are at home after the Watanagashi. At least his father is.
– Keiichi does not go to the hospital.
– No bento.

Similarities:
– Phones are widely used once more.
– Mion (if she actually is Mion) gets posessed by Oyashiro-sama.

Another thing, before I’ll stop, is the following: Keiichi’s behavior. As I mentioned before: he actually cares about his friends this time. These feelings were nowhere to be found at the first arc, as he was just struggling to keep alive, and suspecting everyone and everything. Could it be that Keiichi reacts differently during each and every one of different arcs of Higurashi no Naku Koro ni?

Some quick first impressions: Yoshinaga-san chi no Gargoyle, Kamisama Kazoku and Demonbane

by psgels, posted in Some Quick First Impressions

And here we have the latecomers of the season, either in terms of air date, or in terms of late fansubs. I’m kindof curious about the series which still have to be subbed. There are about six of them left, but there might be something very interesting among them.

Yoshinaga-san chi no Gargoyle
An example of good shows almost totally ignored by the fansubbers is Yoshinaga-san chi no Gargoyle. The story’s about a very energetic, young girl, who won a living, stone gargoyle by accident. Ever since, the gargoyle has been protecting the little girl’s house, but he’s a bit too enthusiastic in this, trying to burn everyone who comes close. The little girl does not like these events, so the’s often yelling at him, resulting in some awesome scenes. The case introduced in the first episode also was a beauty. it’s about the daughter of a blind man, who comes to understand the blind man’s guard dog. Greatly excecuted. Yoshinaga-san chi no Gargoyle certainly isn’t the best show around, though it will definately be entertaining.

Kamisama Kazoku

When I first heard about this title, I kept hoping for this show to be centered around lots of puns. The main character also looked relatively old, so I kept hoping for him to be the only mature, while his family was something around the lines of the Kami-sama in the Law of Ueki. That really would’ve been awesome. Alas, I was wrong. Totally wrong. Our main character remains a 12-year old brat. His entire family is crazy, but it isn’t centered around puns, it’s centered around perverts. Ugh. What could’ve been an amazingly cool hippy turned into an old pervert who grants his son any wish he wants. His mother and sisters don’t make this a lot better, as they’re the standard harem-cast featured in all of those other anime. Our main character also has someone who loves him, namely an angel sent from the heavens in order to protect him. Just when I thought this couldn’t get any worse, this angel (named Tenko) managed to save it, right at the last possible moment of the episode. If this show will revolve around her mental breakdown, I’ll be happy. I also have to say, that the character art, although messy, looks good.

Demonbane

Garbage, garbage, garbage! This SO contains every single fantasy-harem cliche, puts it into one series, and thinks it’ll be succesful. Apparenly, destiny plays a big role in this thing. Our main character is destined to drive the most powerful mecha ever, he’s destined to meet up with a beautiful girl, merge with her, and he is certainly destined to save the world. There’s one thing that cracked me up, though: the beautiful irony of a statement that was made at the end of the episode: “Does a hero become a hero from the moment he’s born? No, a hero is one who follows a path of bloodshed with an iron will.” Oh, the beautiful irony. This show doesn’t even know it sucks. On a side-note: the art looks horrible as well.

.Hack//Roots – 07 – Building up

by psgels, posted in .Hack//Roots



Apparently, we never know what happened at the end of the last episode, as we only get to see the aftermath. We start with Sakisaka officially breaking his ties with Tawaraya (the first time in which we see him actually surprised in a negative way).The discussion which follows is very dynamic, good job to the creators.

We then switch to the headquarters of the Twillight Brigade. Shino suggests to actively communicate when something goes wrong. Then we go to the bridge, at which Phyllo and B-Set talking about the rumours of the members of TaN attacking the Twillight Brigade. TaN-members are also showing up more than usual.

Tawaraya suddenly gets a huge blow in the back, as he gets obsolete as soon as he finishes his mission. This suddenly is a huge change when you compare it to the fifth episode. Ender also reveals that she’s into a serious mission, and that there’ll probably some kind of trap to lure Ovan out, though everything will be ruined when he doesn’t show up. The talk between her and Naobi is kept very cryptic, so we don’t get much wiser after the end of this conversation.

Goad also comes with an interesting observation, which most people might’ve figured out by now. I however, didn’t see it. It seems that there are only six virus cores known. One is in the possesion of TaN, and was used by Tawaraya in order to convert Sakisaka. The other one was found by Ovan in episode five. Shino holds the third one. Phyllo gave the fourth one to Ovan. The backgrounds of the fifth and the sixth ones aren’t given yet. Anotehr interesting note is that Phyllo actually is pretty strong, as he easily manages to beat Goad. He reminds me of Bear from .Hack//Sign, in a certain way.

Ovan, meanwhile, will be leaving for a while. It’s got something to do with his job, and he already got scolded by his manager once. He orders Shino to order Sakisaka, Tabby and Haseo to look for the remaining Virus Cores, while she has to wait for his orders. Shino gets worried about this, especially concerning the PK-ing, though she listens to Ovan. It really feels like this show is building up at the moment. Especially Ovan and Shino’s characters weren’t too worthwile in the last couple of episodes. Shino only had one moment to shine in episode three, and Ovan was good in the first episode, but the two of them really toned down a bit. They do, however, show great potential for future episodes, so let’s keep hoping.

In the meantime, Haseo has another supernatural experience. It still doesn’t make any sense at all. Why do these target him only? He goes to tell this to Phyllo, though he backs down in the middle of the conversation. I so loved this moment. As Haseo’s shy, he doesn’t know how to continue a conversation like that, so he chooses the easiest option of just running away. I’m kindof ashamed to say it, but that’s probably the way I would’ve reacted as well.

We then switch to Tabby, Sakisaka and Haseo, who head for the lost grounds while Shino patiently waits for Ovan. They then find the same A-shaped mark from previous episode and the commercial-break-scenes. They then turn to one of the other lost grounds, at which another one of these patterns lies. This one, however, does react to Haseo. It then teleports our heroes into something we have to find out in the next episode.

Nothing awesome in this episode, though it remained enjoyable. It feels like the characters which are going to shine later in the series really are holding too much back right now. I also hope that Haseo’ll have more contact with as much different people as possible. I really liked it when he did this in the past.

xxxHolic – 07 – Getting saved by people you hate

by psgels, posted in xxxHolic



The element I like most about xxxHolic definately is the deepness of all the different messages featured in the episodes. This episode probably was the deepest yet. The show really is getting better and better. Today’s episode starts off pretty lenient, but it really gets more serious by the minute.

Rain is falling during the entire episode. We start off with Watanuki walking outside, carrying an umbrella and complaining about the rain. He then gets punished by a very talkative and easy ticked-off red haired girl, the same we saw in the OP. She appears to be a rain-sprite, and needs Watanuki’s help for something.

This girl is very amusing. Especially her look when, back at Yuuko’s, she gets to see a special performance by Maru, Moro and Mokona. Then Yuuko talks to her, immediately annoying Watanuki by defining him as her “property”. It appears that this girl wants someone saved. According to Yuuko, Domeki plays a key-role in solving this, so Watanuki goes to pick him up, against his will, of course.

The rain sprite then sees that the combination of Domeki and Watanuki could be the key to helping her special person. But first, they head to Himawari in order to borrow something that she’s wearing. Watanuki really freaks out during this scene. Anyway, the two of them manage to get Himawari’s ribbons.

The problem lies with an hydrangea-flower. It’s grown to be huge, its flowers have turned red, and Watanuki can clearly feel that there are evil spirits roaming inside this thing. We see a couple of minutes of Watanuki and Domeki investigating, until Watanuki gets caught inside the flower.

Inside the flower, everything’s pure black. Here, Watanuki meets up with a crying girl. She wants to go somewhere, but she’s afraid to do it alone. Then we meet the fatherly side of Watanuki, as he tries his best to cheer up the girl. She accompanies him through the darkness, until a they reach a point which looks like some kind of entrance to some dark and gloomy place. The girl wants to go in, but Watanuki gets his doubts.

Then we see a very interesting way of dialogue. Beams of light appear, and each of them represents one (japanese) letter. I really liked this, and it gives the overall atmosphere a really nice dark undertone. We then see a number of raindrops appear, along with Himawari’s ribbon. Watanuki then uses the ribbon he carried with him, and he gets out, after comforting the girl once more, in a really fatherly way.

He wakes up under the hydrangea from before, now with blue flowers. He holds hands with the girl, though she seemed to have been dead from the beginning, and then he sees a very pissed-off Domeki. And this is where the great part of the episode begins. It was really nice to see Watanuki this calm, though it was definately nothing special. Just another case which had been solved.

Though then it appears that Domeki had been standing in the rain for a massive TEN hours, waiting for him. Yuuko explains what happened afterwards, when both of them have taken a shower. His wound from the time with the Angel-san has also gotten a lot worse, though Domeki isn’t the one who’ll mention it. That means that Watanuki owes him big time for saving him. (after all, Domeki used Himawari’s ribbon in order to get Watanuki out). This brings up so many interesting issues. It’s definately clear that Watanuki hates Domeki. The two of them make a nice team, but that fact remains.

But what happens when Watanuki suddenly finds out that Domeki’s willing to go through such lengths, in order to save him? Would he have done the same thing? Especially if you consider the wound. And what if you also consider the fact that that little girl was actually heading for the netherworld for people who tortured and killed others and persons who commited suicide? This means that she was actually leading Watanuki to his own suicide if Domeki hadn’t shown up. And what about the precious item Domeki had to give Yuuko in order for her to give the information on how to save Watanuki?

The rain sprite also was interesting. It appears that she didn’t want to save the girl in the first place. She wanted to protect the hydrangea. She doesn’t care about humans at all, though the hydrangea seemed to be an elemental spirit, corrupted by the deeds of the little girl, whom it actually tried to save (the beams of light from before belonged to the hydrangea, it seems). She ends with an interesting statement: humans don’t save elemental spirits, then why should elemental spirits save humans?

I liked the use of umbrellas, this episode. Each of the characters had one fitting their style of clothing. The rain sprite had one to match her dress, Watanuki’s umbrella was an ordinary blue one, and Domeki had one in the style of feudal Japan. I also loved Domeki’s methods to ignore Watanuki whenever he got into one of his hyperactive moods (which happened a lot this episode).

PopoloCrois Story 1998 – 11 – Awesome Plot-Twists

by psgels, posted in Popolocrois Story 1998



I have to admit: when Ston and Sanda first got their hands on the Anemoritos, I really though that this would be solved within the first five minutes of the next episode. Boy, was I wrong! At that point, I never would have imagined that the storyline would turn so awesome from that point on. This episode definately was no exception.

The highlight of this episode was one of the best plot twists I’ve ever seen since Fantastic Children and Paranoia Agent. Remember last episode? Well, Gamigami decides to go extreme by switching Popolocrois Castle and his own tower from location. Now, Pietoro and his parents have to live in a barren wasteland. An interesting note: during the transportation, Gamigami managed to generate the same light pillar as in the first episode. This might be very useful for later.

Pietoro continues to blame himself for what happened. All because he let Gamigami take his dragon-powers. Though I think that the major fault lies with the love-potion. Without that, Gamigami’d never have Hyuu’s support, and he’d also never have the motivation of taking over the castle. Anyway, it takes a LOT to get Pietoro cheerful again. In fact, he’s so depressed that at one point, he even begins to stare at a piece of rope in a very “suggestive” way, if you know what I mean. I found this extremely well excecuted. Especially when he went out to sit on the roof of the castle as usual. When he looked down, and saw the unfamiliar scenery, he really was scared, and became afraid of the height.

Gamigami, meanwhile, is heavily celebrating his achievements, along with Hyuu. She, however, doesn’t share his happiness, and she keeps mentioning that something is missing. Ston and Sanda also aren’t too keen on Gamigami’s enthusiasm, with all kinds of sarcastical comments following.

Pietoro, by the way, is also the only resident of Popolocrois Castle who feels gloomy. The king and queen, the servants who got transported along with the castle, all of them are cheerful. Even the angsty advisor was happily playing cards with Paolo. Pietoro’s mother then tells him a tale of the time when Paolo was still young. He came from a very poor village at that time, and he had to do his utter best to gain a single bean in one certain winter. He then saw a hungry, nearly dying fox. Pietoro’s mother doesn’t finish this story, though, but lets Pietoro figure it out for himself.

Hyuu, meanwhile, is certain that something is missing. Though she doesn’t know what, exactly. Then Gamigami calls Hyuu, in order to show his newly created vehicle, in which he plans to ride through the castle town in order to pimp his new title. This is all accompanied by a very nice soundtrack. And we immediately find out that Gamigami can’t sing. AT ALL. Ston and Sanda definately agree with this.

Paolo, meanwhile, is ready to let his servants who got transported along with the castle know his next plans. Instead of doing what everyone thought he’d do, he puts on a farming-suit, and starts attempting to fertillize the barren plains around him. Pietoro’s mother joins him.

I am not paying attention at all, during an episode. That became clear with the scenes which were shown afterwards. Only when we switched back to Gamigami again, I finally understood what was happening. It was so brilliant. It’s so obvious, though I didn’t think of such a simple issue AT ALL, which makes it even more awesome. The following scenes are all accompanied by a great soundtrack, and Pietoro finally gets his enthusiasm back, and he sets off alone.

And just when you think we’ve got enough plot twists for one episode, Hyuu throws another one in our face. She makes another demand to Gamigami: bring Pietoro to her, and make him her servant. I couldn’t believe this when I saw. I’m really beginning to wonder what she wants to do with Pietoro in the first place. This show definately made me see that Hyuu is incredibly unpredictable in her behaviour and reasons. She wants to be with Pietoro, that’s obvious. But why does she want to use him to get home? Or does she even want to go home? Hmm….