Tag: recent

Drifters -11[The Adventure of the Pistol Daimyo ~Bullet Counting Song~]

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Drifters

I really must have given the Orte far more credit than they were due as their end truly is more pathetic than I could have imagined. I at least thought they would put up somewhat of a fight and make it that the Drifters would have to earn their domain. But what quite literally happened here was that they just walked in and declared Orte finished. In my last post I complained at how the  Orte never truly posed much of a threat against the the Drifters and I suppose it is rather appropriate that they get pushed to the sidelines quickly to let the real antagonists jump in. So with this the stage is set for the last battle of the series and admittedly it is a much more interesting one than the Orte could have been. However I fear that the Ends may be falling into the same trap the Ortc fell into, namely that they simply aren’t all that much of a threat to the Drifters. Gils did give the Drifters trouble but it looks like their forces and even Rasputin are being undermined.

I think a good conflict such have both sides on even footing and not show one side as too overpowered for too long. I did get a kick out of how Rasputin was doing the usual criminal mastermind play before having Toyohisa destroy his plan and outright ignore him. But I don’t really get what the original plan was. Clearly the Orte would never surrender to the Black King because the Black King has made it clear that he intends to kill all humanity. So how exactly would Rasputin convince them to surrender, even if he had troops within the city? Well knowing the Orte they might have been dumb enough to actually take his spiel about begging the Black King for mercy and letting them be his vanguard. I do enjoy seeing Rasputin get a good kick to his pride but the problem with this show is that the Drifters don’t have good enough opposition. If the Ends are just going to take the place of the Orte as the Drifters personal punching bags then that just defeats the purpose of getting rid of the Orte in the first place.

I admit I don’t have much to comment about this week. I think nearing the shows end I find that having things to say about a show that is essentially style over substance is getting a bit sparse. I don’t think Drifters can escape the curse that befalls most anime adaptions in that they wait for a sequel to conclude what they start in one season. A sequel often never to come.Though in Drifters case I am not really sure I would be all that sad if it never got a sequel. As an anime it was a serviceable show and enjoyable, but lacked something to make it really great. Perhaps the problem is in that it tried to emulate Hellsing on a grander scale but style can only carry the show so far. The comedy is certainly it’s weakest element and the characters have interesting points but really it’s their historical backgrounds that give them character. Otherwise they come off as the same type of character, that being the stone cold badass. And if everyone is the badass, no one is. So for last minute impressions  before the finale, Drifters was a good watch but I doubt I will ever want to check it out again. Well maybe to watch it dubbed but that’s more to see if it has a different feel in English. After all Hellisng Ultimate dubbed is just marvelous.

Occultic:Nine – 11[We Want the Airwaves]

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Occultic:Nine

My mind is made of mush when watching this episode. I think there should be some rule forbidding such excessive exposition in one episode because I started zoning out five minutes in. Had to pause the episode four times just to let the information sink in. The good news is that watching this didn’t make me want to throw up. The bad news is that the more this plot tries to wrap itself up, the more utterly moronic it becomes. If you are a poor unfortunate soul like myself still watching this show then allow me to break down this jibber jabber into something meant to be understood. The first three minutes essentially are just Gamotan explaining to the others about information Ryo-tas/Aveline told him. A smart show would just skip over the explanation and show only the characters reactions. For the viewers already know all this and going over it again is just useless padding. Something this show definitely does not need seeing how you have to fast forward the exposition so much. What follows is a giant explanation over the nature of ghosts and the spirit realm. Now to the normal watcher they would just take the explanation as is and not think too much about it.

The show certainly wants you to do that because while the explanations are overtly complex, the conclusions are simple and really stupid. You see what this whole thing is, is that this shows logic makes a giant leap and to obscure that it hides it under a large amount of gobbledygook. It’s like this for example: physics have yet to explain how a bee flies, therefore humans can fly without propulsion. Disregarding that the bee thing is a complete myth, the writing puts immense effort into explaining the former so that you don’t take the time to question the latter. I am working with bare minimum science education here so don’t take my word on matters of that but this show is essentially stating that the human world and the spirit world are like separate radio frequencies. Basically while alive you are attuned to the living frequency and when you die it is adjusted to the dead frequency. Now I originally thought this was just a metaphor but it seems the story of Occultic;Nine takes this quite literally as apparently radio towers were used to adjust the individuals dead’s frequency to the living frequency. So essentially it’s saying that human souls are basically sound waves which can be attuned to both living and dead worlds.

That is quite dumb as sound is essentially vibrations in the air and I believe radio waves are essentially electromagnetic radiation. Claiming that human souls are somehow contained in this is like claiming that air is sentient or that water can feel. It’s ridiculous. After this we have the manager enter and reveal that he was the weird masked man going around disappearing spirits. Also he’s the leader of the cult and the murderer of both Gamotans father and the professor. We have foreshadowing for only one of those things Occultic;Nine, not the other two. Hell that foreshadowing was only last episode so in the span of one paragraph of exposition this man turned from being a small background character to one of the main antagonists. He works for the villains, he killed Gamotans father and he killed and scalped the professor…and delivered the scalp to the curse girl. Wait, why did you do that last part again? Actually why did you open up a store that was closed for two years and get Gamotan to come to it and did nothing but feed him crap drinks and why is he the sole person in charge of getting rid of ghosts when he’s in charge of a whole cult and….(BANG!)…Sorry I was overcome with the urge to hit my head off the desk. What was I on about again?

So manager now turned into antagonist is defeated by Gamotan because he has some special power of some sort which boosts his synchronistic with the human world allowing him to been seen and touch…wait can’t all the ghosts interact with the human world?! They have been doing it the entire series and not just Gamotan, the reporter girl opened the moai statue, they pulled out books so why is it being put down that Gamotan can only interact with the world after being shot with the raygun? Also based on the next line of exposition are you really telling me that Gamotan just so happened to coincidentally have this special absorption of electromagnetic energy and coincidentally Nikola Telsa’s descendant was giving the task of monitoring him who coincidentally is taken over by the ghost of Telsa’s daughter who planned for him to coincidentally come across the professor’s murder and take the key to the gun and then using a combination of her raygun and a special power Gamotan can use because his father coincidentally modified his transistor radio with a tesla coil and…(BANG! BANG!)…sorry got that urge again. This show isn’t good for my head.

Lets just wrap this up before a split my skull open. So I mentioned that the direction wasn’t bad as last episode but that doesn’t mean it isn’t still bad. For one, there was a part of this episode where Ryo-tas/Aveline was explaining how it was totally logical that Tesla went to Japan and had a half Japanese daughter that was never mentioned in history. At the point when she mentions Japan it just flashes up the Japanese flag for a second. You know just in case you didn’t know what Japan was while watching a Japanese animation, with a story set in a Japanese city which is currently broadcast in the nation of Japan. We have a conclusion to the curse girl and her demon fellows arc as it turned out he’s not her brother but inherited his memories from a transplant…it’s was pretty stupid when Grisaia did that thing and yep, it’s still stupid. But we have verified that both these characters have no worth to the plot whatsoever making them completely pointless and all their screen time for naught. Must…resist…urge…well I supposed brother demon dearest did give the detective and writer the get out of jail free card by stating that time in out of body experiences moves faster than real time. Meaning that this story is likely going to end with the characters awakening before drowning in the lake and hereby negating the entire plot. Which is just going to be…real super. So we got a villain headquarters and our bunch of misfits are going to assault it despite none of them having any real combat experience. Have fun storming the castle!

2017 Winter Anime Season Preview

by AidanAK47, posted in Seasonal Previews

It’s that time of the year again. With snow on the ground and Christmas lights about but that’s not what we are here for. Anime be my bread and my wine, and my presents if luck be true. I am lamenting over not being able to get the Spice and Wolf Collector’s edition book. Living in Europe can be quite troublesome sometimes but hey at least I got a Fullmetal Alchemist Collector’s edition that has a replica of the gate which just looks beautiful. Who knows, maybe I might even get around to watching that stockpile of Blu-ray anime i have sitting in my room. After the steam backlog is done i will have time…hopefully. Moving on to what really matters, a new anime season is coming up and forgive me if this sounds uncharacteristic of me but this season is looking very promising. We got second seasons of great shows along with Trigger saving anime again and even some pretty interesting shows in the lineup. I got my eye of a few here and while we got the usual lineup of straight to trashcan anime, there’s quite a lot of good to make up for potential bad tidings to come. 2016 certainly ended on a ominous note.

Same rules apply as before. The poll below will be used to gauge what you readers want us writers to cover this season. Vote for as many shows as you like. In regards to opinions on most sequels, if you liked the previous season then by all means continue. As usual I have checked out every source I can find, read manga, light novels, played video games…If I can get my hands on it then I will look at it to get a better idea of what the anime can offer.

This poll is no longer accepting votes

What will you be watching this spring?
VoteResults

Once again thanks to Mario for gathering the images. With that let’s get this show on the road.

 

The sequels/prequels I don’t care about

Gintama(2017)

Reikenzan: Eichi e no Shikaku

Rewrite / 2nd Season Moon-Hen/Terra-Hen

SUPER LOVERS 2

Yowamushi Pedal: NEW GENERATION

Tales of Zestiria the X 2

 

Series I don’t look forward to

 

AKIBA’ S TRIP: THE ANIMATION

Studio: Gonzo

Director: Hiroshi Ikehata

Script/Series composer: Kazuho Hyodo

Akihabara, a broad-minded neighborhood where everyone from beginners to masters are welcomed. Even when you’re alone, if you go to Akiba, you’ll find someone who understands you. It’s a neighborhood where anything is possible, where anyone can do seemingly anything; a place where you can lay bare your body and soul. In this neighborhood of Akiba, which has everything including anime, games, maids, idols, secondhand parts, and cheap food, battles are fought against the “Bagurimono,” and a steadfast “boy meets girl” story begins!

Let it never be said that I am not through and to get an idea for what we are in for I bought Akibas’trip Undead and undressed on steam and played through it. Admittedly the story of this anime isn’t related to the story of this game as it’s the second game of the series and I see none of the characters in the promo art. But it does give me an idea of what we are in for. I was really surprised by how much the story of the game took itself seriously. The characters treat the whole idea of stripping vampires to expose them to the sun with a surprising amount of righteousness. However unlike Keijo which shines in not recognising the utter ridiculousness of it’s concept, Akibas’trip just becomes another supernatural battle story when it disregards the whole stripping aspect. It also feels like a tourism ad for Akihabara at times. In fact that description up there is more endorsement of Akihabara than saying anything meaningful about the show. I truly don’t expect much for this and having Gonzo at the helm doesn’t make me think this is going to change my expectations. Director is a newbie and the series composer worked on Relife and that’s about it.
Continue reading “2017 Winter Anime Season Preview” →

Occultic;Nine – 10[Another Girl, Another Planet]

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Occultic:Nine

“As to her purpose, I am going to make a random guess that she’s the descendant of Nikola Tesla or something.”

I wrote this about Ryo-tas in the comments of the 04-06 review and now I say I goddamn called it. So now Ryo-tas has a point, in fact she is now the centerpoint of the entire story. For that all the writer needed to do was transplant another character on top of her and make it that her toy ray gun is…it’s the entire key to the…oh god it’s the entire key to the evil organisation guys plot. Oh for f*cks sake! My brain hurts from the complete stupidity of this show. I mean you go to so much trouble inventing some puzzle that the professor left behind which needed to be solved using Baudot code and whatever bloody stuff you googled for five minutes on the internet, yet when it comes to your main plot it’s just this utter wreck of nonsense. I know it’s likely obvious by now but allow me to be blunt with you. I hate this show. I hate everything about it. I have long stopped caring about anything that happens in it and at this point it has become truly painful to watch.

The plot twists just make me want to shake me head and this show may have the worst direction I have ever seen. Other shows could be faulted for having direction which was dull and uninteresting but the direction of this show makes watching it a arduous task. This entire episode was filled with dutch angles which are normally supposed to instil discomfort on the viewer for a particular scene. But this episode was filled with them regardless of what was even on screen. There are shots where the screen is flipped 90 degrees for no reason. This episode went even further with the utterly outrageous shots were all spatial awareness is thrown out the window and they just put the two characters in the same shot regardless of their positioning in the scene. If I showed this to a film student I am certain he would start hitting his head off a wall at the seer incomprehensible incompetence on display. It’s one thing for a show to be bad but for a show to quite literally make the viewer physically ill from disorientation while watching it is a new low.

So what happened? Well Ryo-tas is now possessed by the spirit of Nikola Tesla’s daughter which he never really was supposed to have. How? We get a big old infodump which essentially says that ghosts can do this because shut up and deal with it. This is found out because the professor’s son happened to open a book that spelled out that Ryo-tas was a descendant of Tesla. That’s good but why is the psychometric girl also landing on the same conclusion despite her having no real reason to look into it? Then we have the curse girl and her “demon” which may actually be her brother now I think. There’s a guy in a creepy mask going around erasing the ghosts made by the mass drowning and it’s being suspected that he is the manager of the restaurant everyone goes to. He also kills two people somehow…moving on.  Apparently professor guy not only listed the names  of the people that drowned but also the medical data from the hospital they went to for various different ailments. This seems to be the reason they were picked out to drown because the hospital was testing if they were compatibility with magic ghost maker pixie dust. Also Doujin girl somehow faked her death and I surely look forward to how the writer is going to crowbar her into this whole mess too.

This show may be well on it’s way to being my worst anime of 2016 but it surprises me that it seems to be still getting a positive reception from some people. I normally would at least take others views on a show into account but if anyone tries to tell me this show is well written I would accuse them of being blind. The plot has long since stopped making any logical sense and the characters either infodump about a ludicrous mystery or throw some token angst. Mister blogger kids reaction to the ghost of Christmas Tesla could very well sum up my reaction to the series as a whole but regardless I still don’t get why he is even involved with all this. In fact why are any of these people involved with this? By my estimate over half the cast has nothing to do with the core mystery but perhaps they are there to remind us that even though no character bonding happened on screen that it did happen off screen. By now I just want this show to end, please just end. The time to stop has come and i don’t care if it means not airing the last episode. Just stop…before I strangle the director.

Drifters – 10[Baba Yetu]

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Drifters

The black king is hinting it hard that he is Jesus that it would now be surprising if he wasn’t. All his powers seem to stem from miracles Jesus performed. The other ends remark that he is a tacticians nightmare in how he can provide an endless supply of food and heal soldiers quickly, thus allowing them to join the battle again. However based on how salt is dropping from him as he walked here, it seems his powers are not without price. He even said that unlike god he is not immortal so he couldn’t provide food forever. That said his powers are still nasty as he beats a dragon by giving it super cancer.

One thing that might not be clear is that after getting the dragon to join them, the Black King has his armour melting down his scales for weapons and armour. Based on how the scene was shown it took me a moment to truly recognise what was going on. Otherwise the Dwarfs have joined the Drifters army and the three transvestite Drifters are proving that they won’t be winning any fanclubs from anyone watching the series. All things considered the main count looks to have a good head on his shoulders but his group exemplifies the worst aspect of this show and are pretty down to death stereotypes which lack the charm of Puri Puri Prisoners overblown example of this character archetype.

As we have reached episode 10 and the end of this series draws near I have found that overlooking the series as a whole this was mainly a story about building up a conflict that we will most likely never see. If this is the only anime season we get of the series then the story will be rather underwhelming. As an example, a common complaint of Re:Zero was that it’s run was mainly a buildup for confrontations later down the line. However while it is true that the main plot of Re:Zero was unresolved, it did provide conclusion to it’s individual arcs. While loose ends were left, the conflicts introduced in the series were resolved before series end. Drifters on the other hand has been mainly focused on the Drifters and the Ends building their forces.

They have had a skirmish but it is highly unlikely that they plan to finish each other off by the end of this season. From the looks of things the Orte will be the series finale and the ends will be left for another undetermined season. Maybe even then a second season would just build a battle destined for a third season. As an anime fan I have long since gotten accustomed to shows not having definitive endings. Though in that case I at least would wish the series provided enough highs that a second season wouldn’t be a necessity. With this show however what we have is mostly just the Drifters steamrolling the Orte which while not boring, is rather empty.

Occultic;Nine – 09[Future Days]

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Occultic:Nine

The presentation of Occultic;Nine is starting to remind me of speed Racer, an anime from a bygone era which had a rather infamous dub. Basically due to the literal translation, the way which Japanese can say more with less words and the speed of dialogue it required the dub actors to say a large amount of words as fast as possible. This resulted in a dub to one of the very first anime localized in the US and quite possibly the worst dub ever to grace the medium. You see when you are so focused on spitting out the script at high velocity it’s difficult to truly emote or present said script in a watch that can be engaging. Even Bakemonogatari takes moments to slow down to get the emotion out while Occultic;Nine attempts to have an emotional reconciliation in the span of thirty seconds. This is just abysmal, on all fronts besides animation and art. I don’t blame those guys as purely on animation and art this show has been rather impressive, I even found the point of view shot with Miyu walking down to the boys killing room to be really well done. But direction, editing and dialogue is just a pure trainwreck.

But let us try to piece together just what is going on here. Well first Miyu is a goddamn moron as just from a text message from her old friend she decides to go to a secluded location where she previously met the murderous kid, down into a secret passage that opened out of nowhere and through an incredibly ominous tunnel that screams get the hell out to any sane individual. I understand that grief can have an effect on people but this…this is just nonsense. I would believe it if she was going there for revenge but she truly believes her friend was alive despite seeing the bloody remains first hand. There is overcome with grief and then there is being an utter moron, you have fallen into the second category. But with this we get some insight into who this boy is and the Kotoribako. Basically this boy is a living person who has been  killing people because he sees them as rare cards somehow and he makes people into kotoribako because he wants to get rare cards. So to summarize the above, the boy and Kotoribako…are absolutely irrelevant to the main plot. The only thing this whole side plot did was give the main characters some exposition to figure out a bit of the evil organizations plan, exposition which the child knows because…he’s a rich kid? Um…I…bloody hell…just…just what is this? How is this writer getting work? What editor approved this? This development adds nothing to the narrative but more plot-holes! This is what this writer utterly infuriates me as it reminds me of the asinine stories I used to write between classes when i was a teenager. I know this logic, the reason this boy is in the story is because he wanted a psycho boy in the story. For that’s what he thinks is cool, logic be damned.

On the upside Ryo-tas looks to be getting a point. Seems her bouncing about like a preschooler was all just an act and she seems to be the mysterious Zonko which has been communicating with the blogger kid all this time. I would like to say this means she’s no longer pointless but well Zonko hasn’t contributed to the plot much either. She told the kid to pull out a tooth and helped him figure out a puzzle with the ceiling. If anything this brings up the very good question that if she knew everything that was going on then why did she spend the last 9 episodes saying and doing nonsense when everyone else was trying to figure out what’s going on. There’s going to have to be a very good reason as to why she kept all this to herself and considering the answers we got so far I say it’s going to be nonsensical. Also oh god the detective mentions that the ghost guy(Another pointless character up to this point) can time travel.

Oh no! No! Hell no! You can’t just put in a throwaway Steins;Gate reference and expect me to swallow that. There are two things which can turn any story into an utter mess and those are alternate dimensions and time travel. Occultic;Nine is already a clusterfuck so this is really the last thing it needs. But most of all…if this all ends with a time reset I will be goddamn furious. The time reset is the get out of jail free card of every hack writer. It is only acceptable when time travel is an integral part of the narrative. Otherwise it’s a cheap method of avoiding consequence in storytelling which renders the entire plot moot. Other than that we just find that the evil organization plan to end the world it seems with this new world plan which I guess involves killing everyone on the planet so they can live as immortal ghosts? But then what about the mind control plan? Is that still in effect? Well tune in next time and prepare to see none of the occult stuff in the opening as well as any occult in general. Couldn’t even live up to the name…I have a headache now.

Drifters – 09[Serious Bomber]

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Drifters

Drifters is at it’s best when the Orte are getting trounced and they are certainly getting a beating here. I could complain over how the Orte are one dimensional villains but after the master race bull and the concentration camp here they are quite literally Nazi’s at this point. Nazi’s are the one type of villain that always deserve a good beating. However it would be good to see the Drifters having some challenge here as the Orte are posing as much of a threat as rubber ducks. This is in part due to the drifters making use of actual tactics when the Orte are following the bare necessities of leading an army. Seeing Nazi’s get killed is hardly a unsatisfying experience but a one sided battle is a rather dull watch. I did think the Orte might actually put up some sort of fight when they brought out the heavy armored knights but that was quickly taken out with Olminu’s walls and gunpowder. Speaking of which I thought Oda’s gunpowder would require a year for the materials to be produced. Was there a time skip I was not made aware of?

Olminu must have a hard time off screen as it seems that all she is to the characters is a walking boob joke. It’s unfortunate when your mentor is praising your talent and calling you a prodigy only for him to remind us that she has breasts. She certainly does but really what does that have to do with anything? I say the Drifters crew need to take a look over at Occultic;Nine as there is a much more deserving target for the boob jokes. Ryo-tas could use some mockery over her design because it is certainly driving me insane at just how no one in the show remarks about the girl who looks like she got a XLL size breast transplant. Olminu is at least proving that she has an actual point in the series besides being a pin up girl and it would be nice to see her get some respect for it. That and the boob jokes got old fast.

Oda is once again flabbergasted over technology as he marvels over the communication device which is a orb that essentially acts as a transistor radio. His revelations over how this device would revolutionize warfare also brings up a fair point about Murasaki’s actual job. I for the most part assumed that this battle was essentially a minor spat between EASY and Murasaki for entertainment but there is a question about Murasaki’s actual job. This episode seems to suggest that Murasaki takes Drifters from other world to provide perspective and innovation to another, hence preventing stagnation. It’s possible this was the original purpose of Drifters which has been turned into a war between EASY and Murasaki. It doesn’t excuse the fact that these two are wreaking a unrelated world over a personal grudge but it does give some light into why these two even exist.

On the ends side of things the black king is teaching the monsters agriculture which might explain as to why they didn’t send their full force to kill the Drifters. They mentioned this before but the ends intent appears to be only killing off humans in order to hand the world over to the monsters for them to take humanity’s place. So essentially the ends are saviors to the monsters who are wiping out humanity to give them a chance at a better life. The contrast is rather interesting. The ends are teaching their side agriculture and farming whereas the Drifters are teaching their side war and weapon making. Makes one wonder who is the true villain.

Occultic;Nine – 07-08[Happiness is a Warm Gun]

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Occultic:Nine

By episode sevens end it did confirm that indeed, the majority of the cast is dead which brings up a whole host of problems. For you see while this twist may seem like a interesting left turn, it only really works if you consider the time a character is shown on screen the only time in existence that they have. This show demands that you completely disregard the other free time you would assume living beings have in life. For if you take that into account then these people should have figured out something was wrong much much sooner. After all, if they eat then they might wonder why the store attendant is ignoring them while confused at how products were carried to the till by themselves. If they don’t eat then anyone would notice if they went several days without eating. There’s also problems with general rules of how they are perceived. The show already establishes that they have a physical presence and can bump into people. But if they pick something up and put it into their pocket then does that item turn invisible? Or is there a floating tooth key walking around when mister blogger goes out for a stroll? The more you think about it, the less sense it makes. This twist also brings the problem that with our main characters dead that means that they are in no danger. That means no tension. On top of all that when you confirm that death is not permanent than that renders death meaningless which is generally why the “dead” twist is often pulled at the end of a story.

Considering the inconsistency of the sped up dialogue I think we can safely say that it isn’t a stylistic choice. More likely the script hasn’t been planned to the time constraints of each episode and the dialogue is sped up to compensate. A very unwise method of trying to squash it in as it kills the pacing and whatever immersion the viewer had when all the characters start speedrunning their dialogue. I actually wondered if the video was literally sped up as people start vomiting exposition at a rapid rate. Also boy, that exposition. I said before that I doubted this show would have satisfactory answers for any of the questions it poses without resorting to something dumb. Thus I hereby say I called it because good god this is dumb. So the Kotoribako which was given so much attention previously now seems to have no real purpose. Instead this seven gods cult thing has somehow cultivated both a mind control drug and a chemical which can allow you to retain yourself after death. There’s some info dumping nonsense about them doing this by following some notes by Nikola Tesla and perfecting it by analysing a thesis written by the professor who was murdered.

So this is treading the old ground of Chaos;Head in which a scribble written by the protagonist on the back of a homework essay somehow lead to the creation of reality wrapping machines. Not sure why they did this seeing as a second time round this explanation is just as dumb as the first time we went through it. Maybe even more so. But we ain’t done yet as it turns out that the mysterious evil organization was created by Mr Not-neets dad. How this happened was that the dad was a radio show host who used to take questions from viewers and give advice(You know typical radio show stuff) but he was apparently so good at it that he started giving live seminars and then it became a cult. Feel free to read over that sentence and let it sink in that someone wrote this down and didn’t see anything wrong with it. Sure not-neet says it’s far fetched but it’s not even that, it’s downright impossible. It wasn’t even a big radio station, just some small town one and yet it somehow gained such a following that it spawned an evil organisation with plans for world domination?

This writer continues to utterly baffle me with how he fails to see the utter ridiculousness of his own ideas. If this anime was satire or comedy that might be something. But it’s clear that we are supposed to take this 100% seriously.  Personally I find that difficult when the main villain has a plan as ridiculous as a old bond villain. All they really need now is a volcano lair and they got the whole set. Seriously how are these evil organizations even formed? How do you gather a huge group of like minded people to sit in a room all day discussing how they are going to rule the world by injecting mind control drugs into world leaders? Guys, are you sure you planned this out? I mean you think no one is going to notice all the world leaders acting weird? Who decides what, how does it even get done? After all even if you take over the world leader there is still a government that’s not going to approve your slave collar law. What are you even going to do with the world?

Because nobody really thinks about that, considering that running one country’s affairs is a giant pain in itself. Of course maybe they don’t really care about running the world well but then what’s the bloody point? Rule the world just for bragging rights? As for other events Ryo-tas remains a waste of screen time besides being a mannequin with basketballs glued to her chest. The rest spend most of their time discussing if they are dead or not, or being depressed about it. The other antagonists on the other hand seem happy enough to talk enigmatic despite the fact that the audience has long since stopped giving a damn. Admittedly I am skimming over character interactions and just commenting on the mystery of the show but that truly is the only thing carrying it. Which makes it all the more noticeable when you can poke holes in it till it all just falls apart. By now, in this story sense is a sandwich so sure, why not just throw in an inexplicable moai statue contraption whose sole purpose seems to be poor security for a usb stick.

Drifters – 08[Mystery Call Me]

by AidanAK47, posted in Aquarion Evol, Currently Watching:, Drifters

It looks to be a trend of drifters to follow a high action episode with a cooling down period. Though it does leave me with little to comment on. Scipio meeting Kanno and neither being able to understand each other lead to what may be one of the few jokes that actually hit with this series. Albeit one of the jokes that requires some knowledge of world war II to get. It certainly got a big smile from me though Kanno seems like the type of character who is perpetually pissed off. Meanwhile Hannibal has gone senile without Scipio around to keep him focused which makes me wonder why Murasaki didn’t pick him up from a earlier time in his life. Though considering how he reacts to Toyohisa it could be that his senile status is a just an act though for what purpose I couldn’t tell. The dwarves look to be next on this liberation campaign and I really wonder when it became commonplace that elves live in forests using bows and that Dwarfs are underground and are great metalworkers. In some ways Tolkien cursed the fantasy genre by giving it a standard template.

Abe no seimei brings up a certain concern I had regarding the drifters in that none of them seem to really care about the effect they are having in this world. I don’t quite agree on his assessment that Hitler was trying to help in his own way but considering that Hitler was after his time it safe to assume that Abe doesn’t know just what Hitler has done. Oda’s clearly lays out that he has plans that go beyond just beating the ends and Abe more or less has to go along with it as there really isn’t a better way to defeat the ends. However it’s clear that the Drifters and ends are altering this world beyond repair. The ends have followed with the old saying that if life gives you lemons….kill everything. Meanwhile the Drifters are introducing concepts much earlier than intended, with Hitler creating a second WWII germany and Oda pushing to create modern firearms which would throw the power scale all out of whack. Though we do have the issue that just because Butch and Sundance use guns, that does not mean they know how to make them.

They seem to be getting there though as Oda is making gunpowder and it seems the transvestite count will help with creating the primer later down the line. But man, Oda’s reaction when the cowboys started telling him about modern firearms and how he knew it would change everything about war. So both the heroes and the villains don’t actually care what happens to the world  and for that matter I am thinking that Murasaki and EASY don’t care much either. We don’t actually know why they started this game in the first place but considering the overly familiar approach EASY takes with Murasaki it could be that this game is just a matter of passing time for them. In truth perhaps the Ends are not the actual endgame of this series but instead the final bosses are these two. Who treat humans as mere playthings to entertain themselves.

Drifters – 07[Chaos Diver]

by AidanAK47, posted in Currently Watching:, Drifters

Considering this is the first clash the Drifters had with the ends things went rather smoothly. They managed to take one down and send the other one packing. This really is what Drifters is best act, balls to the wall action and insanity. Admittedly I wish the animation is better as it does rely on closeups to cut down on the animation needed. But I wholeheartedly admit that Ufotable may have spoiled me in regards to fight animation. This was indeed a spectacle of badassery and with the leader of the Octobrists bringing in the rest of the Drifter I think we could have some interesting interaction and culture clash as they bounce off each other. One thing I particularly loved was when Butch and Sundance brought out the Gatling Gun. The look on Oda’s face when he saw that gun was priceless. As a guy who heavily pushed firearms in Japan during his time, I most certainly think he will be interested in that beast of a weapon. Big problem is that upon gunning down Giles they did mention that they used up the last clip and i think it would be a major problem figuring out how to reproduce the bullets.

As for the battle itself, Toyohisa once more working with suicidal charges, Yoichi shoots arrows and Oda hangs back to lead the elves. If it’s one thing this episode pointed out it’s that the ends really do have a massive advantage in this battle. If they are all as hard to kill as Giles then they happen to have superpowers along with heavy invulnerability. Though the difference could be like Toyohisa said, the ends are now exactly professionals when it comes to combat. At least what I heard of Joan of Arc she wasn’t exactly famous for being a great fighter and Anastasia certainly has no real combat experience. That does seem to be the turning point in this battle, Easy is choosing tragic figures who have reason to hate the world while Murasaki is choosing Military commanders and strategists. The only thing that really give the ends the edge is there supernatural tendencies so Murasaki may be onto something here.

So Joan of Arc is defeated by our resident Samurai and upon confirming she is a woman, he refuses to kill her. Allow me to ask the loaded question. Does that make Toyohisa sexist? Well looking at the actions presented here the answer to that question would be yes and yet calling Toyohisa sexist just doesn’t sound right to me. After all he did thank the octobrist girl for helping to save his life and trusted her to help him in battle. I believe this does present a certainly nauce often overlooked by more overzealous types that attempt to label every person, word, action and home appliance as sexist in some nature. In my personal opinion I would deem that Toyohisa is not sexist but is instead following the traditions and beliefs of his clan which have been pounded into him from birth. Those traditions are indeed a product of a time less kind to woman but to Toyohisa these very things are his reality.

Imagine if you will that you walked into an alternate reality where fish swim in the sky instead of the sea. Wouldn’t that feel wrong? After all fish swim in the sea, it’s what makes sense, it’s what you have been taught from the beginning. Same goes for Toyohisa, in his world woman stay off the battlefield. That’s just his reality. If he came from a world which woman fought on the front lines it’s likely Toyohisa wouldn’t have any real problem with Joan being on the battlefield and would have beheaded her. So is Toyohisa in the wrong here, I say no. The only thing wrong here is that Toyohisa let a very dangerous individual live to fight another day when he could end her then and there. Otherwise Toyohisa was simply living up to his character as someone deeply entrenched in his beliefs. The only thing I find immensely weird here is that Toyohisa was confused over Joans gender and yet Yoichi he recognized as a man immediately? How very odd.