Sora no Otoshimono
Short Synopsis: Our lead character gets his own god-mode android angel servant.
Well hello… fanservice. Well, at least this shows knows its target audience, but it still puzzles me why they don’t just turn these concepts into hentai-series. Here we have a series in which an android angel servant falls from the sky, and the lead character just happens to be at the right time and place to have her bump into him so that she makes a contract with him and fulfills every of his wishes. The guy is your typical teenager, so you can imagine how he ends up abusing these powers. The series has the typical flaws of a harem-series: lots of clichés (he gets woken up by a cute childhood friend, there’s a huge magical sakura tree near where they live, et cetera), pointless fanservice and a male lead of who you wonder why he’s even popular with girls. I think the biggest flaw of this series is the lead character himself. Sure, there have certainly been worse versions of him, but his attempts at being funny just end up as annoying and his voice-acting is pretty annoying to listen to. I liked the white-haired guy, but overall this is just a waste of a perfectly good budget.
ED: I presume that the animation is going to be filled in the next episode. The song is nothing special, but not particularly bad.
Potential: 10%
Miracle Train
Short Synopsis: Our lead character tries to help troubled ladies along with his team of bishies.
Aha, Iyashi-kei! It’s been a while since we had one of those. This episode really had that typical calming atmosphere of the Iyashi-kei series, but at the same time it also has a lot of issues. Most notably, the bishies. I like the idea of personified subway stations helping passengers through their worries, but did they really have to look like a bunch of ugly bishies with ridiculous hairstyles? Most of the time they’re acting like stereotypes as well, especially that yellow-haired guy was obnoxious. Especially the scenes in which they talk to each other are cringe-worthy. Nevertheless, when push comes to shove it does manage to pull off a nice down-to-earth story for the troubled passengers. If the future episodes can focus more on those passengers and less on the bishies, we could have something very interesting here.
OP: Cheesy J-rock. Move on.
ED: Slightly better, but still generic J-rock
Potential: 50%
Natsu no Arashi! Akinai-Chuu
Short Synopsis: Our lead character is surrounded by lots of cute girls.
Like White Album, I’ve been heavily debating whether or not to blog the second season of Natsu no Arashi. Sure, the first season was very good, but this is Shinbo, after all. No matter how good the source material, I have this feeling that he’s going to take its style to extremes again while forgetting what’s really important. And really, it didn’t help that this episode was probably the worst of the entire series. It was a beach-episode, but the thing is that it just wasn’t funny. The whole episode was just a string of random fanservice-jokes, and lacked the wit or subtlety from the first season. Among the rest of the jokes were also lots of recycled ones (the creators are still going on about Hajime vs Jun, the salmon-thing returned yet again and the creators were even desperate enough to recycle a joke from Sayonara Zetsubou-Sensei and the Samurai-Jokes from Pani Poni Dash!). Sure, this series might pick back up, but this episode just showed too many signs that the creativity of Shinbo has run out, and I don’t want to blog this series just for the sake of finding out whether I’m right or not in this. Also, why the heck are the creators hinting at a romance between Jun and Hajime?!
OP: Like expected from Shaft, at least it has a pretty good OP. Creative visuals and nice music.
Potential: 30%
Awww, man. If Natsu no Arashi screws up I’ll be really disappointed. Has Shinbo let money go up his head?
Waiting for your impression of Miracle Train.
Wasn’t it the case that the first episode of the first season of this was pretty different from the rest of the series too?
… I actually enjoyed the first episode. Sure, it had indeed nothing to do with the plot like this one, but at least it was funny and witty. This was just a fanservice-fest.
I always expected Jun and Hajime would eventually be a couple in the end, though it would be through implication with escape room so as to keep some otaku somewhere from burning down buildings. How can two people in a comedy bicker constantly with each other and not end up together? You can’t neglect your formula like that.
“Our lead character tries to help troubled ladies along with his team of bishies.”
LOL! This is another reason why I missed that segment so much.
“Has Shinbo let money go up his head?”
Are you sure you want to be blindly saying this while there’s a good number of evidence that SHAFT is having trouble financially, and they still need to hire people?
@Maserbeam: …well, SHAFT be damned.
So psgels, how does Miracle Train compare to Bartender? I’m quite a fan of Iyashikei.
I find the concept and execution of Miracle Train to be meh. Guess I’m not the intended audience for it. I did like Bartender though.
Miracle Train was a trainwreck! I’m so not the target audience for this. Natsu no Arashi 2 seemed to join the crash. Amp. What happened Shinbo? I don’t want to see another Bakemongatari. I was wondering what happened to Sora no Otoshimono…
Howling-kun: it does have a long way to go before it reaches the level of Bartender, though. It’s by far not as intelligent or creative as that series. It’s nevertheless a nice watch.
No, please Psgels, you can’ honestly want to blog G@y Trainz. I’m sad T_T
I found Miracle Train the most interesting idea so far from what I have seen or heard of the new season.
Train stations incarnated into bishies sounds so bizarre, I guess it’s some kind of cultural shinto influence (of which Hetalia axis powers and akikan must be other manifestations).
The series looks terrible, but I think it will be a guilty pleasure, as long as they manage to find more interesting stories than that of some random lonely teen.
Oh I also noticed those freakin’ cliches in Sora no Otoshimono. So many to mention already not just with the main character, but even with the other main females.
But I like the white haired guy . . . and the evil class president . . she’s my goddess . . .damn . . . ONLY WATCHING SCENES WITH THEM xD
I’ve been meaning to follow the Second Season of Natsu no Arashi for a while
Why do you blog series that are harem? To make fun of how they are bad in story? Everyone gets the point There is a quality in any anime, except maybe 90% of those with pinnochio graphics you chose to give a high score to… ->
About the ridiculous hairstyles… if you mean ridiculous because it’s unrealistic then I have to remdind you that we’re talking about Japan and its guys… the characters’ hairstyles are pretty common. Maybe the green hair from Tsukishima is a bit unusual/exaggerated though.
Apart from that I won’t say that the whole series does not seem pretty ridiculous to me but I guess if I’ll ever watch it that is exactly the reason why I’d do it.
wtf: you just answered your own question: there is quality in every anime, and I’m just giving every anime a chance to impress me. It’s just the fact that there are so many harem series out there that you often see me making fun of them. 😉
Also, what pinocchio graphics?
Marebito: yeah, I meant the hair colours. It’s one thing for anime to have unrealistic hair colours, but this is just too extreme.
By Pinnochio graphics I mean mostly the anime which procure you the latest fanciness in precarious proportions and sd graphics (if such terms happen to exist- 😀 ). (kaiba,strange dawn, etc…) Usually filled with an overdose of lacking humor and third-class attempt to build up realism, often making them appear Communistically ugly like that anime “Konnichiwa Anne”; Which is easily outclassed by the likes of Doreamon and Nobu in terms of effort to production. And why the hell not add Hamtaro as well while we are at it…
@psgels: Thanks for answering my question. I just got into Bartender myself. I’ll be waiting for the day you watch Aria, probably the best Iyashikei available in anime form in my opinion, since the YKK OVAs don’t do the manga justice (just because they’re TOO short).
How exactly can something be “filled with an overdose of lacking humour”? If it’s lacking, doesn’t that mean that there’s none of it? Besides, Strange Dawn, Kaiba and Kooniciwa Anne don’t attempt to be comedies at all, and instead go for a serious story with serious character-development, and that’s what I like about them. Apparently, you’re more into humour, which indeed makes Sora no Otoshimono and Natsu no Arashi a better choice.
wtfblog so bestow the light upon us stupid folk. If something like Kaiba wich has that dreadful Pinocchio (with 2 c’s) graphics and is one of the best series and with peculiar themes out there, tell us, please, what anime has quality? Naruto? Dragon Ball maybe?
Dragon Ball and Naruto are ok if you never seen an anime in your life D: if you like it sure why not, everyone starts with a shonen. (implies a 99% male audience :P)
Going back to subject:
I think that old school designs belong to a certain caste of elite artists, so those that try and attempt to imitate the Miyazaki style fail on all aspects since there is only 1 Miyazaki.
I also think that anime that work well are those that work with a stereotipical formula in most cases.
(which explains why anime which are uncommon like Guin Saga and Tokyo Magnitude 8.0 get a good rating. Since they go out of the hero-friends-goal-ennemy..etc formula.)
Some anime didn’t get credited right in my opinion, on this blog. Valkyria Chronicles was dropped after 6th episode,which was like (wtf?) (ok the story is not perfect and there were flaws in the way the battles were animated, but overall it did what it had to do. Also there is a pretty solid fanbase behind it. (because of the game) So dropping it was very strange. (at least imo)
Also on this blog certain animes that “certain” people might want to see; comedy, etc. ; get potential rates at: 0%, 10% 20%
But you can’t just base a potential of a series on a preview or 1 introducing episode at most. (which in a large number of cases are never the best)
For example right from start you could say 07-ghost is bishounen in appearance so it has a yaoi-side bla bla etc, 0% for yaoi (ofc that didn’t happen) but like you should probably take more the public opinion. I donno ask people if they think its an honorable estimation. Take in count the various fanbases and how they react before giving 0%.
Otherwise you have the best english anime blog out there, with a very systematic organisation, so keep up and dont feel offended if I went too harshly on my opinions 😮
Is there a reason you might expect that someone would watch shows they don’t like in order to write synopses for shows they don’t like? Write your own blog entries and you can give Valkyria Chronicles nine gold stars for being based on a video game, and Kaiba ten red sickles for communist animation.
wtf: the reason why I rate so many comedies with low potential is simply because I’m judging them as comedies: if they can make me laugh, they’re fine, but if they can’t make me laugh, didn’t they just fail as comedies? And that’s the case with a lot of comedies this season. I could be wrong, of course, but that’s why these posts are called “quick first impressions”. They’re not meant for me to fully judge shows, but rather to determine which series I’m going to follow this season.
As for why I dropped Valkyria Chronicles, it was getting tedious to blog it.
wtfblog, you clearly like other kind of shows than this blog owner. There are many blogs that give focus to different genres, according to the owner’s tastes.
People follow blogs that reasonably go for their same tastes.
So, being this a blog that gives credit to other than fancy graphics, light entertainment and mainstream series, and mostly despise stereotypes, you clearly are out of place here.
Stop asking why your average nice kiddy show wasn’t blogged in favour of other less known and difficult shows. Those are serious and incomprehensible stuff (mostly) not for kids, you can’t reasonably like them.
Go play elsewere or try to stay here and understand this blogger’s judgement criteria. You may find something new and better than your beloved stereotypes.
Does anyone know what is the song that plays exactly after the opening of Natsu no Arashi? It sounded pretty good…
I thought the episode wasn’t that bad… Maybe it was the weakest episode yet, and it did have more fanservice than is healthy for it, but it was ok. It got a few chuckles from me.
ah yea!? in your jewels! signed: alicia mechiott! xD
”Write your own blog entries and you can give Valkyria Chronicles nine gold stars for being based on a video game, and Kaiba ten red sickles for communist animation. ” -m @ October 6, 2009 @ 4:57
Hilarious xD
Except I would have used ‘…and you can give Valkyria Chronicles a nine-gun salute for being based on a video game,’ The communist sickles were HAHAHAHA!
im so helpful HAHAHAHA! and I should have given myself a 9 characters xD, HAHAHAH! the HAHAHAHA’s were so HAHAHAHA! xD
-_-