BLAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARG!
Okay, if you go and look at my previous post, you'll notice that I've put a line through everything regarding moving my anime posts. That is no longer the plan. The plan will be to keep things here as they were and put all future anime related posts here. Somethings have changed about basic web hosting that is starting to drive me crazy (including blogger), but I've decided that this place is fine for writing anime and manga reviews.
Of course, WHEN I'll start writing new anime reviews still remains unknown. My anime watching habits have ground to a halt, unfortunately. It's not like I don't love anime anymore, I just don't find myself sitting down and watching it like I used to, and it doesn't make sense to make watching anime some kind of chore. I want to enjoy it, not turn it into work (unless anyone is willing to PAY me to write anime reviews!), so this blog is going into a light hibernation (as if it wasn't before). I know that I will want to watch anime again sometime, and when that happens, I'll try to put some effort back into this blog.
So that's how it is. All the promised big changes resulted in nothing getting done. Oh well.
5.24.2012
Shifting Focus! Check out my new site!
Glancing over my statistics has shown that there are some of you who do find your way here, but I haven't updated this place in almost a year. It's terrible, especially since I have so much more to say about anime. I admit that my watching habits have gotten kind of bungled, but I do want keep writing about anime.
WHERE . . . I write about anime, however, is going to change. Given my interests and the way things are going in my life, I've decided to consolidate some things and simply focus on one website, which will be http://joshwaters.drupalgardens.com from now on. I'll still have an anime tab so you can just focus on my anime stuff if that's all you want, but you are certainly more than welcome to look around my new site. I'll probably continue tinkering with it as time passes, but for now it will work as a place to post my stuff.
Perhaps at some point in the future, I'll drag all of these reviews and thoughts over to the new site, but I'm not quite sure how I want to do that. (It's more than just simply transferring the stuff over; do I really need to keep the long introductions?) For now, they'll just stay here. In the meantime, for new thoughts and reviews on anime, go to my new site.
Thanks.
Thanks.
8.11.2011
The Battle Against Negligence Continues! Hoshin Engi, Dragon Ball Kai, Fractale
Eeeeeeehehehehehe . . . . . . Yeah, I still not keeping this thing up to date. Then again, I've had quite the first half of a year. Let's just say a lot of things have changed. For starters I'm going back to school and I haven't really been watching that much anime. I decided to completely skip the past Spring and Summer 2011 seasons as I saw very little to be interested in. I might go back and watch Tiger & Bunny or No. 6, but there's been very little to be excited about these past seasons. In fact, the few I picked from Winter haven't been complete winners either, as you will see.
I haven't slacked off on my manga, though, so let's start with that:
Hoshin Engi (23 Volumes)
Rating: 5/5
I love this series.
I actually remember that this was the first series I ever read scanlated waaaaay back in 2001 or 2002. I had stumbled upon it in the midst of my Anipike wanderings (who remembers Anipike?!) and was totally in love with a hero who used his brains instead of his brawn. Later, when I watched the Soul Hunter anime several years later, I realized that it was based on that manga I read back in high school. Since then, I decided to use a bit of brains myself and got my local library to pick up the whole series.
And what a great series it is. Taikobo is a sen'nin, a kind of supernatural being, who is given the Hoshin Project to help protect the world from a Demon who has taken control of the Empire. Based on a classic Chinese novel that takes place at the end of the Yin Dynasty (roughly 11th Century BC), Ryu Fujisaki takes several liberties, slowly adding more and more science fiction elements that turn it into quite the epic.
The thing that sets Taikobo apart from his fellow Shonen Jump peers is his way of solving problems. Instead of resorting to brawn and tapping on reserved powers, Taikobo uses his brain, creating cunning plans to outwit his enemies. While this is still a fighting anime series (Taikobo does raise an army and gathers a handful of companions), his methods tend to be so unorthodox that it instantly makes him memorable. More than once he twists the situation to the point that he's the villain just so that the problem can be solved without any casualties. His kind of cunning and meta-problem-solving makes him very reminiscent of other famous Trickster Heroes like Br'er Rabbit and Till Eulenspiegel (or Bugs Bunny, if your not some snobby folklore literatus).
Another element that makes this series stand out is that it never compromises its goofiness. Even to its epic finale, it never takes itself too seriously and is a total blast to read from beginning to end. This series is highly recommended for everyone. Go read it!
Dragon Ball Kai (97 Episodes)
Animation: 3/5
Story: 3/5
Music: 4/5
Overall: 3/5
I know I reviewed Dragon Ball Z already on this blog, but I figured it'd be worth at least talking about the Kai version for a bit.
Dragon Ball Kai covers the first two major story arcs of Dragon Ball Z and while it's cool that they got all the voice actors to redo the dialogue and gave it a new soundtrack, it does feel a bit like a cash cow, given that they're simply reusing old animation and given it an HD face lift.
Unfortunately, I don't know if their "face lift" really helped much. There were times when I watched it that I felt the animation was worse than the original. Never during my run of DBZ did I think some of the frames had been colored win MS Paint by a middle schooler. I understand that they were trying to smooth out some of the faults of the old films but some of those shots just looked terrible. They didn't happen often, but I think I saw almost one scene per episode that was like that.
The pacing certainly was interesting, though, as they decided completely new points on which to end episodes. However, having most of the filler cut down still didn't make the series feel any shorter, and when filler was left in, I was a bit annoyed, but I understood that some of the later scenes wouldn't make sense if side characters suddenly appeared out of nowhere.
I admit that I think the music was an improvement over the original Japanese soundtrack. While all the orchestral scores were still very Toei, it felt fresh whereas the old one was a bit dated.
As for the series ending where it did, I'm okay with that. I never really got into the Majin Buu/Fusion stuff, and having the story end there does give it a better sense of closure without resorting to the ridiculous. I know that FUNimation completely redubbed the series (I remember joking that they could edit up the old dialogue in the same spirit as Toei, so redubbing it is pretty cool), but I haven't watched any of it. Should I ever get the feeling of watching more Dragon Ball, I'll have that to look forward to. To be honest, it's been a bizarre, if minor, trend lately to release/rehash a popular series. We've just had Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood, Rebuild of Evangelion, and now Hunter x Hunter is being given a second shot with rumors of Rurouni Kenshin making a comeback. At least they're all being reanimated, something that I think could have improved Kai greatly. Oh well.
Fractale (11 Episodes)
Animation: 4/5
Story: 3/5
Music: 3/5
Overal: 3/5
This wants to be a Studio Ghibli film so bad it hurts. I imagine going up to anime producers and saying "Castle in the Sky in eleven episodes" may be a great way to get attention from the get-go, I think it's worth remember that a movie is only two hours and a season's worth of anime is around ten.
I'm going to borrow Wikipedia's plot summary. It's not exactly something I want to do, but they're pretty concise this time and I'm feeling a bit lazy. "The story takes place on an island resembling a futuristic Ireland, in a world ruled by the 'Fractale System' that ensures mankind's stability and prosperity. One day, Clain meets a fleeing girl called Phryne, who disappears during the night leaving a pendant. When he is able to activate the pendant (which turns into a 'doppel,' a kind of robotic hologram, named Nessa), Clain sets out for a journey with the girl-shaped avatar Nessa to look for Phryne and discovers the secret behind the Fractale System." From there Clain runs into Lost Millennium, a rebel group dedicated to destroying the Fractale System because it encourages people to lose touch with reality and face-to-face conversation. However, people are so adjusted to the Fractale System that taking it away all at once could cause all sorts of problems. To Clain's credit, he takes neither side and only wants to help his friends Phryne and Nessa, both of which turn out to be fundamental to the Fractale System.
While it certainly does try to raise some interesting questions (pros and cons of virtual reality, etc.), and gives us some nice, sweeping landscapes and epic airship battles, it really can't shake the notion that it's simply padding in filler until the climax. I think that 11 episodes really was too long for the story it was trying to tell; perhaps if they reanimated it as a compilation movie, it'd work better.
Still, it was a pleasant change from the normal anime fare we get these days. Nice pastoral scenes and music, especially the end theme, create a very casual, relaxing feel even as things get turned upside-down and serious. Given the modern trends of hardcore grit or over-the-top moe, Fractale offers and nice third direction that aspires for Miyazaki greatness. It's just a shame that it falls so short.
Hopefully, I'll get back on top of this blog and post more regularly. I can't promise anything too regular, just striving to write more than I have been. I still have my Fall 2010 selections to finish (I'm almost done), and Infinite Stratos and Level E from Winter 2011. I watch all of Zeta Gundam but decided that I really didn't have much to say about it. It was very angsty to a fault. I mean, something must be wrong when I get excited about a character's death simply because it means that I don't have to hear them anymore. I've put ZZ Gundam on hiatus but I plan to get back to it shortly.
Speaking of Gundam, I'm very excited about this upcoming Fall season of anime. Gundam AGE looks to be like no other Gundam before it. While some are concerned about the Mega Man/Digimon-style character designs, I have no problem with them as long as the story can hold up. The second season of Shinryaku! Ika Musume (Squid Girl) is a part of that season as well, and the aforementioned Hunter x Hunter remake by Madhouse (MADHOUSE!) starts in October. I've actually started watching the first anime series to prepare for it as I'm caught up on the manga. However, after watching three episodes dubbed, I've switched to subs, something I've only done once before and that's with Naruto. It's probably just as well, given that all the OVA's won't have dubs.
In any case, look forward to more reviews as I'm trying to get back into an anime watching rhythm!
1.26.2011
Struggling to get back on track!! Monster, Mobile Suit Gundam, Shinryaku! Ika Musume
You'd think with the free time I have now I'd be able to do this better than ever. Out of sight, out of mind, I guess, but there really is no excuse for negligence in your own promises. Hopefully, this will make up for it a little bit. Now that the holidays are over, things should settle back down to a normal level of insanity. Anyways, let's get talking about anime!
Monster (70 Episodes)
Animation: 4/5
Story: 3/5
Music: 3/5
Overall: 3/5
I'm sure there are several of you wondering about those scores given Monster was made by the critically acclaimed Naoki Urasawa, but I've got my reasons, and no they don't stem from the fact that I watched the whole series on Syfy. While I certainly don't think this was a bad series, I don't know if it really should be lauded as much as other people say it should be.
The story takes place mostly in Germany, with some later episodes in the Czech Republic, and revolves around a Japanese doctor named Kenzo Tenma who is a genius of a brain surgeon. So much so, in fact, that he is the apple in the hospital director's eye and is willing to let him date his daughter. Things seem to be sailing smoothly for our foreigner when he is suddenly stopped one day by a woman while he is walking down the hall at the hospital. The woman demands that he give her dead husband back. Tenma knows nothing about the woman or her husband's case but when she says that someone of higher political position was given treatment over her husband and he died because of it. This ethical conundrum is enough to make Tenma pause and rethink his life and his work.
When a young boy with a bullet in his head is brought in, Tenma sets to work on him when the director decides to pull him away to treat another high society figure instead, despite the fact that he came in after the boy. Tenma decides to follow his heart and ignores the director, saving the boy's life in the process but letting the other man die at the hands of a less capable doctor. However, no good deed goes unpunished as Tenma's reputation tanks immediately. The director treats him like he's not there and the director's daughter dumps him, dropping the engagement ring onto the street in front of him. When he makes it back to the boy now recovering in the hospital, he rants about the injustice and politics of the hospital environment, wishing that the leaders would just die. Then those very men die soon afterword. Tenma is the immediate suspect, but he's innocent, not really knowing what happened. At the same time, the boy he saved disappeared.
The story then jumps to several years later and Tenma is still working in the hospital when one of his patients happens to be a criminal working for a serial killer that no one can find. When Tenma chases his patient, he runs into the grown version of the boy, Johan, he saved so many years ago. Realizing that he was the one who killed the director and his associates so many years ago, he is instantly crushed by tragedy and responsibility, compelling him to seek Johan out and kill him in order to atone for his mistake.
The story moves around a lot from there, taking its time to introduce many incidental characters and how their situations are related to Tenma and Johan. At about episode 20, the story then dumps another ten characters into your lap that run around this tragedy between the principle two. While it is nice to see that anime is capable of telling a dramatic thriller, it still begs the question as to why it needed to be animated. Sure, Madhouse does a great job and I understand that it is rigidly faithful to the original manga, but it started to get a little too long in the tooth towards the end and it got to the point that I basically stopped caring about the characters. I only wanted Johan to die, no matter who got the shot in.
Still, there were some interesting and well-developed characters, which does show that you don't need off-the-wall character design to make characters memorable and perhaps that's why people like it so much. It's not an anime filled with spiky-haired heroes, ridiculous supernatural powers, and epic space fleets, so it has to take its time to tell a story that can still engage an audience. As for the music, I found it to be mostly forgettable (thought I never did listen to the official ending song; I understand Viz Media couldn't get it, not that Syfy would show it anyway.).
Monster certainly stands as proof that anime can do different styles of story telling but I don't know if it deserves to be in anybody's top ten anime. I guess I generally like anime that is willing to use animation as a principle part of its storytelling and Monster's was stiff in this department, relying on a lot of talking-head dialogue to move the story. However, that does give credit to Monster's story because it was capable of carrying the series most of the way through.
Mobile Suit Gundam (43 Episodes)
Animation: 3/5
Story: 3/5
Music: 3/5
Overall: 3/5
I don't know if I ever said as much on this site, but I am on a personal quest to watch all of Gundam in production order, starting with this one. I've since finished Zeta Gundam (which I'll probably review next time), but I thought I would take some time to discuss the classic original series here.
Mobile Suit Gundam (also known as First Gundam) was a pretty big deal in the history of anime, but it certainly had it's share of struggles. Originally 50 episodes were planned, but lack of ratings pushed the count down to 39. However, the director, the now infamous Yoshiyuki Tomino, was able to extend it out to 43 and the series continued to be a mediocre success. That is, until Bandai came out with the Mobile Suit kits that let kids build the robots themselves which sold incredibly well. From there, Gundam has been an ever-present entity in the world of anime, coming out with series after series over their 30-year history with varying degrees of success and popularity. I became a huge fan with Gundam Wing when it was broadcast on Toonami, but I've never really watched the other series except Gundam 08th MS Team and Gundam 00, so I decided that if I'm going to be a proper mecha and Gundam fan, I had better watch this stuff.
The original Mobile Suit Gundam was made in 1979 to 1980 and it shows. It's filled with all sorts of stock footage and certainly takes it time to show off the various suits to ensure that kids will want their parents to buy them for them. However, it also sets up many of the traditions that Gundam has been known for all these years; a political war-is-hell drama, a villain wearing a mask hiding a scandalous identity, great characterization on both sides of the war which makes you a little uncomfortable to be rooting for the good guys, taking a romp around Earth's surface before having an epic battle in space, the rights of people living in space colonies as opposed to those living on earth, etc.
The first series revolves around Amuro Ray, a fourteen-year-old boy whose father has been working on a prototype Mobile Suit for the Earth Federation for the war against the rebellious Principality of Zeon. When Amuro's space colony gets caught up in a battle, he uses the confusion to take the Gundam and help the experimental warship White Base escape to space with several citizens aboard. As they go around space, and later Earth, trying to get the civilians to safety, Zeon's Char Aznable, also known as the Red Comet, chases after them, trying to take them down. Earth Federation bureaucracy doesn't help either as White Base is ping-ponged from battlefield to battlefield. While the series is extremely episodic in nature, it does hold to its subplots fairly well, even if they are the hormonal hysterics of our hero.
The music also deserves special mention here as it sticks to Gundam and general space opera tradition of having various melodic cues mean specific characters or forces. While the music itself isn't great, it's nice to see that they picked up on that style so shortly after Star Wars.
Mobile Suit Gundam is now a relic to be seen and discussed by old-anime fans and anime critics, so those are the only kinds of people who I can recommend it to, if they haven't seen it already. While I don't see myself ever really watching this series again, I'm certainly glad I saw it at least once so that I can truly enjoy the heritage it has left for its franchise and for anime as a whole.
Shinryaku! Ika Musume (12 Episodes)
Animation: 5/5
Story: 4/5
Music: 3/5
Overall: 5/5
I know I promised to talk about Evangelion, but I decided to hold off on that to talk about something new for a change. I've noticed that I don't talk about recent anime all that much so I thought I'd at least throw a bone in that direction. And it helps to talk about a series that I love.
Shinryaku! Ika Musume is the hilarious story of a humanoid squid dedicated to overthrowing the human race because of their negligence toward ocean waters. She decides to take on the polluting humanity by first attacking a seaside restaurant owned by the Aizawa family. However, when she succeeds in blowing a hole through one of the walls, Eiko Aizawa insists that she work it off and before she knows it, she's using her tentacle powers to serve customers at the beach.
When I first read the premise in the Fall Season previews around the web, I knew that I had to watch this series; it looked to ridiculous to ignore. And thankfully that hunch paid off in spades as this is one of the funniest anime series I've seen, putting it in the same company as FLCL and Kodocha (odd crowd . . .). Eiko works great as a demanding straight man, with the rest of the cast filling in around Ika Musume's life (her name really is "Squid Girl" in Japanese).
There really isn't much of an on-going story as each episode contains three mini-stories, but that works fine for this kind of punchy, Azumanga-Daioh-style comedy as we're introduced to the other denizens of the beach, ranging from lifeguards and other seaside restaurants to an adoring cosplay fetishist and a handful of creepy American scientists. The music isn't quite as memorable as the cast, though, even with a hyper, DDR-style opening, but one doesn't really expect hummable themes with a show like this.
It only takes one episode to fall in love with Ika Musume and only three to feel it's hooks deep in your body. If someone licenses this for US distribution, I'll definitely pick this one up. While I do prefer dubs, creating a comparable dub script might not be worth the trouble. Sub-only is probably the best I'll get with something like this anyway. Highly recommended for anyone looking for a light, fluffy comedy to ease them into pure bliss.
Well, it didn't take a year to get a new post on this blog, but I still have a lot of room to grow. I'm going to try to do better at this (and get back to anime watching; I'm falling behind in my other Fall 2010 series!) but I still can't make any concrete promises. Maybe next time, I'll talk about Zeta Gundam, as I said before, and the manga version of InuYasha that I finished (FINALLY!!!).
As for Winter 2011, I've decided to watch Level E, Infinite Stratos, and Fractale (what a debacle that's been lately). I don't see much else that I'm interested in, and I hope I'm not missing anything this time around. Except for Cardfight! Vanguard. There's no way I'm going to sit through a Yu-Gi-Oh! wannabe.
Monster (70 Episodes)
Animation: 4/5
Story: 3/5
Music: 3/5
Overall: 3/5
I'm sure there are several of you wondering about those scores given Monster was made by the critically acclaimed Naoki Urasawa, but I've got my reasons, and no they don't stem from the fact that I watched the whole series on Syfy. While I certainly don't think this was a bad series, I don't know if it really should be lauded as much as other people say it should be.
The story takes place mostly in Germany, with some later episodes in the Czech Republic, and revolves around a Japanese doctor named Kenzo Tenma who is a genius of a brain surgeon. So much so, in fact, that he is the apple in the hospital director's eye and is willing to let him date his daughter. Things seem to be sailing smoothly for our foreigner when he is suddenly stopped one day by a woman while he is walking down the hall at the hospital. The woman demands that he give her dead husband back. Tenma knows nothing about the woman or her husband's case but when she says that someone of higher political position was given treatment over her husband and he died because of it. This ethical conundrum is enough to make Tenma pause and rethink his life and his work.
When a young boy with a bullet in his head is brought in, Tenma sets to work on him when the director decides to pull him away to treat another high society figure instead, despite the fact that he came in after the boy. Tenma decides to follow his heart and ignores the director, saving the boy's life in the process but letting the other man die at the hands of a less capable doctor. However, no good deed goes unpunished as Tenma's reputation tanks immediately. The director treats him like he's not there and the director's daughter dumps him, dropping the engagement ring onto the street in front of him. When he makes it back to the boy now recovering in the hospital, he rants about the injustice and politics of the hospital environment, wishing that the leaders would just die. Then those very men die soon afterword. Tenma is the immediate suspect, but he's innocent, not really knowing what happened. At the same time, the boy he saved disappeared.
The story then jumps to several years later and Tenma is still working in the hospital when one of his patients happens to be a criminal working for a serial killer that no one can find. When Tenma chases his patient, he runs into the grown version of the boy, Johan, he saved so many years ago. Realizing that he was the one who killed the director and his associates so many years ago, he is instantly crushed by tragedy and responsibility, compelling him to seek Johan out and kill him in order to atone for his mistake.
The story moves around a lot from there, taking its time to introduce many incidental characters and how their situations are related to Tenma and Johan. At about episode 20, the story then dumps another ten characters into your lap that run around this tragedy between the principle two. While it is nice to see that anime is capable of telling a dramatic thriller, it still begs the question as to why it needed to be animated. Sure, Madhouse does a great job and I understand that it is rigidly faithful to the original manga, but it started to get a little too long in the tooth towards the end and it got to the point that I basically stopped caring about the characters. I only wanted Johan to die, no matter who got the shot in.
Still, there were some interesting and well-developed characters, which does show that you don't need off-the-wall character design to make characters memorable and perhaps that's why people like it so much. It's not an anime filled with spiky-haired heroes, ridiculous supernatural powers, and epic space fleets, so it has to take its time to tell a story that can still engage an audience. As for the music, I found it to be mostly forgettable (thought I never did listen to the official ending song; I understand Viz Media couldn't get it, not that Syfy would show it anyway.).
Monster certainly stands as proof that anime can do different styles of story telling but I don't know if it deserves to be in anybody's top ten anime. I guess I generally like anime that is willing to use animation as a principle part of its storytelling and Monster's was stiff in this department, relying on a lot of talking-head dialogue to move the story. However, that does give credit to Monster's story because it was capable of carrying the series most of the way through.
Mobile Suit Gundam (43 Episodes)
Animation: 3/5
Story: 3/5
Music: 3/5
Overall: 3/5
I don't know if I ever said as much on this site, but I am on a personal quest to watch all of Gundam in production order, starting with this one. I've since finished Zeta Gundam (which I'll probably review next time), but I thought I would take some time to discuss the classic original series here.
Mobile Suit Gundam (also known as First Gundam) was a pretty big deal in the history of anime, but it certainly had it's share of struggles. Originally 50 episodes were planned, but lack of ratings pushed the count down to 39. However, the director, the now infamous Yoshiyuki Tomino, was able to extend it out to 43 and the series continued to be a mediocre success. That is, until Bandai came out with the Mobile Suit kits that let kids build the robots themselves which sold incredibly well. From there, Gundam has been an ever-present entity in the world of anime, coming out with series after series over their 30-year history with varying degrees of success and popularity. I became a huge fan with Gundam Wing when it was broadcast on Toonami, but I've never really watched the other series except Gundam 08th MS Team and Gundam 00, so I decided that if I'm going to be a proper mecha and Gundam fan, I had better watch this stuff.
The original Mobile Suit Gundam was made in 1979 to 1980 and it shows. It's filled with all sorts of stock footage and certainly takes it time to show off the various suits to ensure that kids will want their parents to buy them for them. However, it also sets up many of the traditions that Gundam has been known for all these years; a political war-is-hell drama, a villain wearing a mask hiding a scandalous identity, great characterization on both sides of the war which makes you a little uncomfortable to be rooting for the good guys, taking a romp around Earth's surface before having an epic battle in space, the rights of people living in space colonies as opposed to those living on earth, etc.
The first series revolves around Amuro Ray, a fourteen-year-old boy whose father has been working on a prototype Mobile Suit for the Earth Federation for the war against the rebellious Principality of Zeon. When Amuro's space colony gets caught up in a battle, he uses the confusion to take the Gundam and help the experimental warship White Base escape to space with several citizens aboard. As they go around space, and later Earth, trying to get the civilians to safety, Zeon's Char Aznable, also known as the Red Comet, chases after them, trying to take them down. Earth Federation bureaucracy doesn't help either as White Base is ping-ponged from battlefield to battlefield. While the series is extremely episodic in nature, it does hold to its subplots fairly well, even if they are the hormonal hysterics of our hero.
The music also deserves special mention here as it sticks to Gundam and general space opera tradition of having various melodic cues mean specific characters or forces. While the music itself isn't great, it's nice to see that they picked up on that style so shortly after Star Wars.
Mobile Suit Gundam is now a relic to be seen and discussed by old-anime fans and anime critics, so those are the only kinds of people who I can recommend it to, if they haven't seen it already. While I don't see myself ever really watching this series again, I'm certainly glad I saw it at least once so that I can truly enjoy the heritage it has left for its franchise and for anime as a whole.
Shinryaku! Ika Musume (12 Episodes)
Animation: 5/5
Story: 4/5
Music: 3/5
Overall: 5/5
I know I promised to talk about Evangelion, but I decided to hold off on that to talk about something new for a change. I've noticed that I don't talk about recent anime all that much so I thought I'd at least throw a bone in that direction. And it helps to talk about a series that I love.
Shinryaku! Ika Musume is the hilarious story of a humanoid squid dedicated to overthrowing the human race because of their negligence toward ocean waters. She decides to take on the polluting humanity by first attacking a seaside restaurant owned by the Aizawa family. However, when she succeeds in blowing a hole through one of the walls, Eiko Aizawa insists that she work it off and before she knows it, she's using her tentacle powers to serve customers at the beach.
When I first read the premise in the Fall Season previews around the web, I knew that I had to watch this series; it looked to ridiculous to ignore. And thankfully that hunch paid off in spades as this is one of the funniest anime series I've seen, putting it in the same company as FLCL and Kodocha (odd crowd . . .). Eiko works great as a demanding straight man, with the rest of the cast filling in around Ika Musume's life (her name really is "Squid Girl" in Japanese).
There really isn't much of an on-going story as each episode contains three mini-stories, but that works fine for this kind of punchy, Azumanga-Daioh-style comedy as we're introduced to the other denizens of the beach, ranging from lifeguards and other seaside restaurants to an adoring cosplay fetishist and a handful of creepy American scientists. The music isn't quite as memorable as the cast, though, even with a hyper, DDR-style opening, but one doesn't really expect hummable themes with a show like this.
It only takes one episode to fall in love with Ika Musume and only three to feel it's hooks deep in your body. If someone licenses this for US distribution, I'll definitely pick this one up. While I do prefer dubs, creating a comparable dub script might not be worth the trouble. Sub-only is probably the best I'll get with something like this anyway. Highly recommended for anyone looking for a light, fluffy comedy to ease them into pure bliss.
Well, it didn't take a year to get a new post on this blog, but I still have a lot of room to grow. I'm going to try to do better at this (and get back to anime watching; I'm falling behind in my other Fall 2010 series!) but I still can't make any concrete promises. Maybe next time, I'll talk about Zeta Gundam, as I said before, and the manga version of InuYasha that I finished (FINALLY!!!).
As for Winter 2011, I've decided to watch Level E, Infinite Stratos, and Fractale (what a debacle that's been lately). I don't see much else that I'm interested in, and I hope I'm not missing anything this time around. Except for Cardfight! Vanguard. There's no way I'm going to sit through a Yu-Gi-Oh! wannabe.
11.11.2010
I'm Back!! Naruto, Black Cat, Requiem From The Darkness
Well, it really has been a year since I blogged here. It's been a very interesting year since then, but I am now finding less and less excuses not to write here. The amount of anime I've watched in the past year has left a lot of tittles to be reviewed. While I may refer to the titles I watched over that lost year, I don't think I'll try to review everything I've seen and mostly focus on what I'm finishing right now. However, here are a few titles that I finished fairly recently. Let's start with the most renowned.
Naruto (220 Episodes)
Animation: 3/5
Story: 3/5
Music: 5/5
Overall: 3/5
Reviewing a long running, shonen/action/adventure series is a different challenge than simply covering a standard length series, especially Naruto. Things tend to go all over the place so maintaining consistency for such a long period of time is pretty impossible. Nevertheless, I have finished the series (FINALLY!) so I shall try to review it as a whole.
As for Naruto itself, you'd have to be pretty new to anime to not know anything about it. Even so, it does have all of the anime formulas in line. Naruto Uzumaki is an orphaned boy who seeks attention and approval by committing pranks and practical jokes. He claims that he'll one day be the Hokage (leader of his large ninja village) and everyone will have to look up to him. Of course, like any anime action hero, he has a ridiculous amount of potential, specifically in the form of a massive demon, the nine-tailed fox, sealed inside of him. As he graduates from the Ninja Academy, he begins his ninja career going on missions, fighting villains, and generally being heroic, all the while getting stronger and stronger. Before long, he becomes the inspiration of those who meet him with his die-hard attitude and contagious cheerfulness.
Of course, you can't get into Naruto very far without also explaining the main rival. Sasuke Uchiha is about as dour and condescending as the hero is bright and friendly, and arguably he has every reason to be. His older brother killed everyone in their massive, prestigious clan, and he is compelled to avenge them. In the meantime, he is forced to team up with Naruto and they tackle missions together with Sakura Kinimoto, a shy but intelligent girl, and Kakashi Hatake, their stoic team leader and coach. At first, Sasuke's dark demeanor plays a great foil to Naruto's exuberance, but as the series goes on, he finds himself moving away from the team and the values they hold. Eventually, he betrays them and Naruto feels responsible, going out of his way to find him and stop him.
Based on a manga from Shonen Jump, all of this feels like Dragon Ball Z all over again. Granted, I would say that it's better than DBZ, but it doesn't do anything all that different. It's more like an upgrade, like DBZ version 1.5. Shonen Jump really has been notorius for taking the basic formula that they established with DBZ and reusing it in different contexts (YuYu Hakusho, Rurouni Kenshin, One Piece, Bleach, etc.). Maybe it even goes back further than that because I find similar themes and conventions in older SJ series like Saint Seiya and Fist of the North Star. In any case, Naruto takes an unique ninja spin on it, all taking place in a fantasy land with occasional anachronistic technology as opposed to traditional ninja locales like historical Japan.
Then there's the infamous filler episodes. For 85 episodes, the story leaves the manga and starts running on a loop like a hamster wheel, throwing Naruto and his wide cast of buddies into mission after mission, none of which really advancing any of the established subplots. They're like the Naruto Movies, except not quite as well written and no where near as a well animated. However, as I was grinding my way through them, I actually started to enjoy them. There were some funny segments and decent action, but most of all it took on a very old-school-American-comic-book feeling of sending out the heroes to defeat the quirky villain of the story. It wasn't great but it worked and I admit I was entertained. Sure, the stories aren't that interesting or integral to the story and the animation suffers some, but I would argue that they didn't descend that far because the main story wasn't isn't mind-blowing anyway and the animation was merely adequate from the beginning.
There is one element that I haven't touched on yet and it's the one that got five stars for me. While it eventually got pretty silly towards the end, I could still enjoy the music. As I watched the series, the music seemed to improve for me. Perhaps it simply stood out more as the series got worse but I'm going to insist that's beside the point. Naruto's music takes two music styles that would seem to fit and blend them together in a way that is absolutely incredible. One is tsuguru, which, if I recall correctly, is based on traditional Japanese music and uses traditional Japanese instruments, but the compositions are more contemporary. The other style is 80's rock. By combining heavy metal riffs with traditional flutes and shamisens, the soundtrack is all at once heart-pounding, epic, fun, and headbangable. I personally consider Naruto's soundtrack one of the best in all of anime.
But music is not everything. Naruto is hard to recommend to anyone because most anime fans have either seen it or seen as much of it as they wanted. I would insist that One Piece and Bleach are better, but Naruto certainly isn't bad. Of course, I've started Naruto Shippuden and, given how long it took me to get through the first series, it may take me a while. But I figure that I might as well continue watching the story.
Black Cat (24 Episodes)
Animation: 5/5
Story: 3/5
Music: 4/5
Overall: 3/5
Another Shonen Jump classic, I really loved the manga for this series. Its atmosphere and character interactions reminded me of Rurouni Kenshin (which is my favorite manga of all time, by the way) so I had been looking forward to the anime adaptation. I had heard that they changed a few things but those changes didn't look like they'd be that much of a hurdle.
And to be honest they weren't. The story only gets 3/5 for a different reason entirely.
Black Cat is the nickname of Train Heartnet, an assassin for Chronos, a secret organization that runs a majority of the world. Known for his deadly accuracy and incredible fighting skills, he became notorious, even becoming one of the Chronos Numbers, their elite group of assassins. Number XIII to be exact, perfect for a black cat.
However, as he is off duty, he is caught off-guard by a female sweeper (read: bounty hunter) in a yukata named Saya. At first he doesn't know what to think of the cheerful girl but before long, she rubs off on him, changing his dour and hateful disposition of one more laid back and joyful. Unfortunately, another Chronos assassin named Creed Diskense happens to be looking on and is horrified by the changes in Train.
In the meantime, Train takes on a job that gets tangled up by another sweeper named Sven because of a little bio-android girl named Eve. Originally designed to be a human weapon, Eve has an unusual run in with Sven where she begins to appreciate the joys of the outer world (she having been sheltered most of her life). After seeing this change, Train decides to leave the girl alone, going against orders and eventually leaving Chronos entirely, a treasonous crime punishable by death. In an effort to bring Train back, Creed kills Saya, but his plan backfires, as the tragedy compels Train to go his own way instead.
From there Train teams up with Sven and Eve (and Rinslet, a professional theif) to take on various jobs and enjoy life. However, Creed bungles up their lives when he declares his own personal war against Chronos by establishing the organization Apostles of the Star. Creed desparately wants Train at his side, but Train is only bent on revenge.
While the changes from the manga are obvious (Train leaves Chronos and partners with Train long before either meet Eve), they aren't what keep this series from reaching greater heights. The problem is actually in the direction.
Let's talk about the animation for a moment. I gave it a 5/5, and it deserves it. Full of style and slick fights, Black Cat is one good-looking anime. But there also lies it's problem. Very little of the animation actually supports the story, making it visually hard to follow. It's all style and no substance. As a result, the story suffers, especially when it decides to have a ending not from the manga only to make a huge mess of things. The new ending (and any of the other changes) were good ideas, they just weren't executed very well.
To go along with the style-over-substance, the music adds all the right touches, being cheerful and nuts when the anime is, but throwing in an iconic choir for the more epic moments. It's well done and memorable.
Still, I can't get over how much it fell flat. It had everything else lined up but in the end the series is just merely adequate. Even at just 24 episodes, it's hard to recommend when there are other series that do the same thing better (Trigun immediately coming to mind). I guess it's for those who like slick animation that doesn't go anywhere.
Requiem From The Darkness (13 Episodes)
Animation: 4/5
Story: 3/5
Music: 3/5
Overall: 3/5
Before I begin, I must admit that I'm not one for horror. I've only seen a handful of horror films, and I don't want to see those ones again. Maybe I'm just a wimp, but I didn't let that hold me back from watching a series that recently showed on the new Syfy Channel (the less said about this name-change-stupidity, the better).
Requiem From The Darkness follows the frightening adventures of a struggling writer named Momosuke who wants to compile a collection of scary stories. In his investigation, he runs into a trio of peculiar characters that have strong ties to the spiritual world and wonder the world of the living looking for beings that have sinned against their particular order. Sometimes the writer tries to help the trio find who they're looking for, other times he's attempting to protect their target. In any case, as the writer travels to find stories, he keeps running into the trio and eventually develops a crush on the voluptuous Ogin.
While the series is very episodic, it does a good job of creating a pretty freaky atmosphere, usually involving people doing horrible things to each other. This series is not very uplifting and each episode usually ends with several people dead. Sometimes the villain is one of them. Sometimes.
While everything else is mostly mediocre, the most memorable part of the series is its unusual animation style. It's filled with characters half in shadow and bizarre backgrounds where straight lines have been slightly warped. Even a simple door frame will be drawn with S-curves instead of a rectangle. Another interesting trick this series uses is some computer animation. Those paying attention will pick out fairly easily, but I still found it fascinating because it coordinated with the overall style, essentially masking the short-cuts they were making in an amusing way. One episode toward the end took place on a small island, so all the ocean water was presented as 3-D graphics, but the water was made to look weird and iconic enough that the cheapness of the computer effects was diminished almost completely.
Perhaps if you're into horror anime, you could kick the overall up a notch and give it shot. There's very little anime like it as far as I've seen. It's not going to change anyone's ideals in anime but it is a peculiar gem that stands on its own.
Not much else to say, really. However, I'll definitely be able to review more anime in the near future, especially some big name titles like Mobile Suit Gundam, Monster, and Neon Genesis Evangelion.
As for the fall season, I've decided to watch Bakuman, Star Driver, Shinryaku! Ika Musume, and Super Robot Wars OG: The Inspector (gotta watch the mecha stuff!). I'm also following Digimon Xros Wars, Dragon Ball Kai, and I'm catching up to Fairy Tail. However, it looks like none of these series will finish by the beginning of January, so I don't know if I'll follow any of the Winter season series. Fractale does look interesting, though.
In any case, expect another post sometime soon. Hopefully, next week. At least I'm gonna try.
Naruto (220 Episodes)
Animation: 3/5
Story: 3/5
Music: 5/5
Overall: 3/5
Reviewing a long running, shonen/action/adventure series is a different challenge than simply covering a standard length series, especially Naruto. Things tend to go all over the place so maintaining consistency for such a long period of time is pretty impossible. Nevertheless, I have finished the series (FINALLY!) so I shall try to review it as a whole.
As for Naruto itself, you'd have to be pretty new to anime to not know anything about it. Even so, it does have all of the anime formulas in line. Naruto Uzumaki is an orphaned boy who seeks attention and approval by committing pranks and practical jokes. He claims that he'll one day be the Hokage (leader of his large ninja village) and everyone will have to look up to him. Of course, like any anime action hero, he has a ridiculous amount of potential, specifically in the form of a massive demon, the nine-tailed fox, sealed inside of him. As he graduates from the Ninja Academy, he begins his ninja career going on missions, fighting villains, and generally being heroic, all the while getting stronger and stronger. Before long, he becomes the inspiration of those who meet him with his die-hard attitude and contagious cheerfulness.
Of course, you can't get into Naruto very far without also explaining the main rival. Sasuke Uchiha is about as dour and condescending as the hero is bright and friendly, and arguably he has every reason to be. His older brother killed everyone in their massive, prestigious clan, and he is compelled to avenge them. In the meantime, he is forced to team up with Naruto and they tackle missions together with Sakura Kinimoto, a shy but intelligent girl, and Kakashi Hatake, their stoic team leader and coach. At first, Sasuke's dark demeanor plays a great foil to Naruto's exuberance, but as the series goes on, he finds himself moving away from the team and the values they hold. Eventually, he betrays them and Naruto feels responsible, going out of his way to find him and stop him.
Based on a manga from Shonen Jump, all of this feels like Dragon Ball Z all over again. Granted, I would say that it's better than DBZ, but it doesn't do anything all that different. It's more like an upgrade, like DBZ version 1.5. Shonen Jump really has been notorius for taking the basic formula that they established with DBZ and reusing it in different contexts (YuYu Hakusho, Rurouni Kenshin, One Piece, Bleach, etc.). Maybe it even goes back further than that because I find similar themes and conventions in older SJ series like Saint Seiya and Fist of the North Star. In any case, Naruto takes an unique ninja spin on it, all taking place in a fantasy land with occasional anachronistic technology as opposed to traditional ninja locales like historical Japan.
Then there's the infamous filler episodes. For 85 episodes, the story leaves the manga and starts running on a loop like a hamster wheel, throwing Naruto and his wide cast of buddies into mission after mission, none of which really advancing any of the established subplots. They're like the Naruto Movies, except not quite as well written and no where near as a well animated. However, as I was grinding my way through them, I actually started to enjoy them. There were some funny segments and decent action, but most of all it took on a very old-school-American-comic-book feeling of sending out the heroes to defeat the quirky villain of the story. It wasn't great but it worked and I admit I was entertained. Sure, the stories aren't that interesting or integral to the story and the animation suffers some, but I would argue that they didn't descend that far because the main story wasn't isn't mind-blowing anyway and the animation was merely adequate from the beginning.
There is one element that I haven't touched on yet and it's the one that got five stars for me. While it eventually got pretty silly towards the end, I could still enjoy the music. As I watched the series, the music seemed to improve for me. Perhaps it simply stood out more as the series got worse but I'm going to insist that's beside the point. Naruto's music takes two music styles that would seem to fit and blend them together in a way that is absolutely incredible. One is tsuguru, which, if I recall correctly, is based on traditional Japanese music and uses traditional Japanese instruments, but the compositions are more contemporary. The other style is 80's rock. By combining heavy metal riffs with traditional flutes and shamisens, the soundtrack is all at once heart-pounding, epic, fun, and headbangable. I personally consider Naruto's soundtrack one of the best in all of anime.
But music is not everything. Naruto is hard to recommend to anyone because most anime fans have either seen it or seen as much of it as they wanted. I would insist that One Piece and Bleach are better, but Naruto certainly isn't bad. Of course, I've started Naruto Shippuden and, given how long it took me to get through the first series, it may take me a while. But I figure that I might as well continue watching the story.
Black Cat (24 Episodes)
Animation: 5/5
Story: 3/5
Music: 4/5
Overall: 3/5
Another Shonen Jump classic, I really loved the manga for this series. Its atmosphere and character interactions reminded me of Rurouni Kenshin (which is my favorite manga of all time, by the way) so I had been looking forward to the anime adaptation. I had heard that they changed a few things but those changes didn't look like they'd be that much of a hurdle.
And to be honest they weren't. The story only gets 3/5 for a different reason entirely.
Black Cat is the nickname of Train Heartnet, an assassin for Chronos, a secret organization that runs a majority of the world. Known for his deadly accuracy and incredible fighting skills, he became notorious, even becoming one of the Chronos Numbers, their elite group of assassins. Number XIII to be exact, perfect for a black cat.
However, as he is off duty, he is caught off-guard by a female sweeper (read: bounty hunter) in a yukata named Saya. At first he doesn't know what to think of the cheerful girl but before long, she rubs off on him, changing his dour and hateful disposition of one more laid back and joyful. Unfortunately, another Chronos assassin named Creed Diskense happens to be looking on and is horrified by the changes in Train.
In the meantime, Train takes on a job that gets tangled up by another sweeper named Sven because of a little bio-android girl named Eve. Originally designed to be a human weapon, Eve has an unusual run in with Sven where she begins to appreciate the joys of the outer world (she having been sheltered most of her life). After seeing this change, Train decides to leave the girl alone, going against orders and eventually leaving Chronos entirely, a treasonous crime punishable by death. In an effort to bring Train back, Creed kills Saya, but his plan backfires, as the tragedy compels Train to go his own way instead.
From there Train teams up with Sven and Eve (and Rinslet, a professional theif) to take on various jobs and enjoy life. However, Creed bungles up their lives when he declares his own personal war against Chronos by establishing the organization Apostles of the Star. Creed desparately wants Train at his side, but Train is only bent on revenge.
While the changes from the manga are obvious (Train leaves Chronos and partners with Train long before either meet Eve), they aren't what keep this series from reaching greater heights. The problem is actually in the direction.
Let's talk about the animation for a moment. I gave it a 5/5, and it deserves it. Full of style and slick fights, Black Cat is one good-looking anime. But there also lies it's problem. Very little of the animation actually supports the story, making it visually hard to follow. It's all style and no substance. As a result, the story suffers, especially when it decides to have a ending not from the manga only to make a huge mess of things. The new ending (and any of the other changes) were good ideas, they just weren't executed very well.
To go along with the style-over-substance, the music adds all the right touches, being cheerful and nuts when the anime is, but throwing in an iconic choir for the more epic moments. It's well done and memorable.
Still, I can't get over how much it fell flat. It had everything else lined up but in the end the series is just merely adequate. Even at just 24 episodes, it's hard to recommend when there are other series that do the same thing better (Trigun immediately coming to mind). I guess it's for those who like slick animation that doesn't go anywhere.
Requiem From The Darkness (13 Episodes)
Animation: 4/5
Story: 3/5
Music: 3/5
Overall: 3/5
Before I begin, I must admit that I'm not one for horror. I've only seen a handful of horror films, and I don't want to see those ones again. Maybe I'm just a wimp, but I didn't let that hold me back from watching a series that recently showed on the new Syfy Channel (the less said about this name-change-stupidity, the better).
Requiem From The Darkness follows the frightening adventures of a struggling writer named Momosuke who wants to compile a collection of scary stories. In his investigation, he runs into a trio of peculiar characters that have strong ties to the spiritual world and wonder the world of the living looking for beings that have sinned against their particular order. Sometimes the writer tries to help the trio find who they're looking for, other times he's attempting to protect their target. In any case, as the writer travels to find stories, he keeps running into the trio and eventually develops a crush on the voluptuous Ogin.
While the series is very episodic, it does a good job of creating a pretty freaky atmosphere, usually involving people doing horrible things to each other. This series is not very uplifting and each episode usually ends with several people dead. Sometimes the villain is one of them. Sometimes.
While everything else is mostly mediocre, the most memorable part of the series is its unusual animation style. It's filled with characters half in shadow and bizarre backgrounds where straight lines have been slightly warped. Even a simple door frame will be drawn with S-curves instead of a rectangle. Another interesting trick this series uses is some computer animation. Those paying attention will pick out fairly easily, but I still found it fascinating because it coordinated with the overall style, essentially masking the short-cuts they were making in an amusing way. One episode toward the end took place on a small island, so all the ocean water was presented as 3-D graphics, but the water was made to look weird and iconic enough that the cheapness of the computer effects was diminished almost completely.
Perhaps if you're into horror anime, you could kick the overall up a notch and give it shot. There's very little anime like it as far as I've seen. It's not going to change anyone's ideals in anime but it is a peculiar gem that stands on its own.
Not much else to say, really. However, I'll definitely be able to review more anime in the near future, especially some big name titles like Mobile Suit Gundam, Monster, and Neon Genesis Evangelion.
As for the fall season, I've decided to watch Bakuman, Star Driver, Shinryaku! Ika Musume, and Super Robot Wars OG: The Inspector (gotta watch the mecha stuff!). I'm also following Digimon Xros Wars, Dragon Ball Kai, and I'm catching up to Fairy Tail. However, it looks like none of these series will finish by the beginning of January, so I don't know if I'll follow any of the Winter season series. Fractale does look interesting, though.
In any case, expect another post sometime soon. Hopefully, next week. At least I'm gonna try.
11.10.2009
Chaotic Updates! Karin, FMA OVAs
Aah-hahahahahahaha! My classes have taken over my life! How long has it been since I updated? Over a month? Geez . . .
Sorry, everyone. This is long overdue, considering the back-logue of anime and manga I've since watched. I'm only following one series for this fall, the aforementioned Fairy Tail, though Book of Bantorra has peeked my interest. However, I think I'll wait for it to end and see what people say about it as a whole.
Karin (24 Episodes)
Animation: ***
Story: ****
Music: ***
Overal: ***
I remember seeing a "preview" for this on some other Geneon disc, which was basically the opening animation and theme. Therefore, I couldn't draw any conclusions as to what it was about. I only saw lots of conveniently censored nudity and a girl who has nose bleeds. I decided it was some fan-service-heavy rom-com and forgot about it.
Some time later, I decide to pick up the first volume of the Chibi Vampire manga, thinking that it looked kind of cute and had some potential. Before long, I burned through what my library had, having endeared myself to the characters and their problems. It was later that I realized that Karin was the original Japanese title and there was an anime series that had the previously described opening sequence. I haven't finished the manga (my hold at the library hasn't come through yet), but I was able to get my hands on the anime's boxset and burned through it, and found it was good fun, like the manga.
Karin is the name of the main protagonist, the eldest daughter in a family of vampires, the Markers (Maaka in Japanese). However, he vampirism seems to work backwards as she has the tendency of creating blood instead of a craving to steal blood from others. In moment's of high blood pressure, she loses control and bites whoever happens to be nearby to pass the excess blood from her to her victum. Naturally, this causes her family no end of worries, simply because they don't know what to do with her. She's a teenager, well beyond the age of maturity for vampires, and yet she has no problem with standard vampire banes. She can walk in daylight, go to school, and hold down a part time job just like any human teenager. Her only problem is the once-a-month blood explosions, which she's been able to keep a secret this whole time, even from her closest friend, Maki.
Enter Kenta Usui, recent transfer student whose family has had quite a share of bad luck. He doesn't know his father and his mother can't hold down a job to save her life (entirely because she's an attractive woman who keeps getting in trouble with lecherous, middle-aged men; she's a complete victum). Because of this, he always seems down and his disposition leads others to think he's always angry (unfortunately, it's just the shape of his eyes).
Well, things get sticky when Karin meets Kenta and her blood starts to boil, curious because her monthly blood problem had recently happened. Turns out that Kenta has Karin's blood affinity, a characteristic or condition of humanity that excites vampires to feed. For example: lying, stress, lonliness, etc. For Karin, it's depression, something Kenta has in spades. Upon realizing this, Karin goes about trying to make Kenta happy so her blood doesn't go haywire. Her first idea: making him lunch.
From there it blossoms into ridiculous and cute romantic comedy as the characters discover each other (Kenta finds out about Karin and her condition quite quickly). It follows the basic premise of the manga, but for its dramatic ending, it takes a different route. Instead of dealing with other vampire families, the Marker family is trouble with a family of vampire hunters. While most manga adaptations that have their own endings can lead to mixed results, at least in Karin it's one of the more creative ideas I've seen, primarily found in the character of Winner Sinclair, the current heir to his vampire hunting family and another transfer student to Karin and Kenta's high school.
I personally consider Winner to be one of the best characters I've ever seen. While he takes vampire hunting seriously, his delivery (at least in the English Dub) is straight up melodrama, resulting in having the rest of the school thinking he's completely insane. As luck would have it, he falls desperately in love with Karin, completely oblivious to the fact that she's a vampire. More romantic hijinks ensue. Basically, Karin doesn't want anything to do with him (because he's a vamprie hunter), so she gets the help of Maki, who happens to be in love with Winner, to get rid of him. Unfortunetly, his obliviousness and devotion to Karin wears them down to the point of simply ignoring him. Probably the greatest result of this is whenever Winner talks to or refers to Maki, he calls her "Karin's friend and sidekick," every time. And for me, it never got old!
While the story is entertaining, I find everything else about the series merely adequate. The music doesn't really stand out, either being standard rom-com suites or old-school horror scores. The animation is decent. The story doesn't demand much action from the animators, but for the climactic ending, the combat strikes me as only being slightly stiff. The character designs are appealing and distinct and for a rom-com, that's all you really need.
I'm looking forward to the end of the Chibi Vampire manga (weird title change, by the way). I'm one volume away, so don't tell me anything. In the meantime, the Karin anime was a fun diversion, using the same characters and situations to present an entertaining anime series. It's not earth-shattering by any means so those unfamiliar with the story may feel either way, but I would recommend it to fans of the manga only for the sake of being introduced to Winner. Seriously, he fits right in like he was meant to belong.
Fullmetal Alchemist OVA Collection (4 "Episodes")
Animation: *****
Story: ***
Music: ***
Overal: ***
I knew that FUNimation had finally grabbed this, but when I saw it in Hastings for about $12 I figured I had nothing to lose. While I wasn't completely blown away, I felt this was a decent package to fans of the series like me.
The four segments have nothing to do with each other (and little to do with the main property) but provide some fun ideas that Studio Bones decided to animate. First is a wrap party by the characters after the "filming" of Conquerer of Shamballa, proving some goofy gags. Second is a side story that treats the audience as a character, resulting in an interesting fight scene between the alchemists and homunculi (it leaves me with the impression that it was orginally part of a ride or event). Third is a curious flash-forward, showing a trio of kids (who look very much like Ed, Al, and Winry) wandering around a modern Japan before returning to their great-grandpa Elric. The fourth is a live-action segment featuring Alphone's armor as he wanders around Tokyo, trying to find Studio Bones.
I don't think I've said this on the blog yet, but I find Fullmetal Alchemist's music to be a bit bland, which was used for the OVAs. Sure, the character themes are alright and the lullabies and comic tunes strike the right chords, but all it amounts to is decent background noise that barely stands on its own. The animation is impressive, though. I'd say it's equal with what Conquerer of Shamballa presented. Slick, immersive, even when everything is chibi-styled it looks nice.
Clearly, this stuff was for the fans, as most OVAs based on bigger properties are. They expect a certain familiarity with the Fullmetal Alchemist story, specifically the anime continuity (though I would suggest that the second segment would be an ideal introduction to FMA). In any case, the set provides some fun chuckles and nostalgias for fans.
This should be good for now, but I've got quite a bit in the future. I finally finished Revolutionary Girl Utena (I was three episodes away for months!). I also wrapped up Gundam 00, which was interesting, and I've got Shangri-La almost done, so there's certainly more to cover. Here's hoping it doesn't take me a month to update this blog, eh?
Sorry, everyone. This is long overdue, considering the back-logue of anime and manga I've since watched. I'm only following one series for this fall, the aforementioned Fairy Tail, though Book of Bantorra has peeked my interest. However, I think I'll wait for it to end and see what people say about it as a whole.
Karin (24 Episodes)
Animation: ***
Story: ****
Music: ***
Overal: ***
I remember seeing a "preview" for this on some other Geneon disc, which was basically the opening animation and theme. Therefore, I couldn't draw any conclusions as to what it was about. I only saw lots of conveniently censored nudity and a girl who has nose bleeds. I decided it was some fan-service-heavy rom-com and forgot about it.
Some time later, I decide to pick up the first volume of the Chibi Vampire manga, thinking that it looked kind of cute and had some potential. Before long, I burned through what my library had, having endeared myself to the characters and their problems. It was later that I realized that Karin was the original Japanese title and there was an anime series that had the previously described opening sequence. I haven't finished the manga (my hold at the library hasn't come through yet), but I was able to get my hands on the anime's boxset and burned through it, and found it was good fun, like the manga.
Karin is the name of the main protagonist, the eldest daughter in a family of vampires, the Markers (Maaka in Japanese). However, he vampirism seems to work backwards as she has the tendency of creating blood instead of a craving to steal blood from others. In moment's of high blood pressure, she loses control and bites whoever happens to be nearby to pass the excess blood from her to her victum. Naturally, this causes her family no end of worries, simply because they don't know what to do with her. She's a teenager, well beyond the age of maturity for vampires, and yet she has no problem with standard vampire banes. She can walk in daylight, go to school, and hold down a part time job just like any human teenager. Her only problem is the once-a-month blood explosions, which she's been able to keep a secret this whole time, even from her closest friend, Maki.
Enter Kenta Usui, recent transfer student whose family has had quite a share of bad luck. He doesn't know his father and his mother can't hold down a job to save her life (entirely because she's an attractive woman who keeps getting in trouble with lecherous, middle-aged men; she's a complete victum). Because of this, he always seems down and his disposition leads others to think he's always angry (unfortunately, it's just the shape of his eyes).
Well, things get sticky when Karin meets Kenta and her blood starts to boil, curious because her monthly blood problem had recently happened. Turns out that Kenta has Karin's blood affinity, a characteristic or condition of humanity that excites vampires to feed. For example: lying, stress, lonliness, etc. For Karin, it's depression, something Kenta has in spades. Upon realizing this, Karin goes about trying to make Kenta happy so her blood doesn't go haywire. Her first idea: making him lunch.
From there it blossoms into ridiculous and cute romantic comedy as the characters discover each other (Kenta finds out about Karin and her condition quite quickly). It follows the basic premise of the manga, but for its dramatic ending, it takes a different route. Instead of dealing with other vampire families, the Marker family is trouble with a family of vampire hunters. While most manga adaptations that have their own endings can lead to mixed results, at least in Karin it's one of the more creative ideas I've seen, primarily found in the character of Winner Sinclair, the current heir to his vampire hunting family and another transfer student to Karin and Kenta's high school.
I personally consider Winner to be one of the best characters I've ever seen. While he takes vampire hunting seriously, his delivery (at least in the English Dub) is straight up melodrama, resulting in having the rest of the school thinking he's completely insane. As luck would have it, he falls desperately in love with Karin, completely oblivious to the fact that she's a vampire. More romantic hijinks ensue. Basically, Karin doesn't want anything to do with him (because he's a vamprie hunter), so she gets the help of Maki, who happens to be in love with Winner, to get rid of him. Unfortunetly, his obliviousness and devotion to Karin wears them down to the point of simply ignoring him. Probably the greatest result of this is whenever Winner talks to or refers to Maki, he calls her "Karin's friend and sidekick," every time. And for me, it never got old!
While the story is entertaining, I find everything else about the series merely adequate. The music doesn't really stand out, either being standard rom-com suites or old-school horror scores. The animation is decent. The story doesn't demand much action from the animators, but for the climactic ending, the combat strikes me as only being slightly stiff. The character designs are appealing and distinct and for a rom-com, that's all you really need.
I'm looking forward to the end of the Chibi Vampire manga (weird title change, by the way). I'm one volume away, so don't tell me anything. In the meantime, the Karin anime was a fun diversion, using the same characters and situations to present an entertaining anime series. It's not earth-shattering by any means so those unfamiliar with the story may feel either way, but I would recommend it to fans of the manga only for the sake of being introduced to Winner. Seriously, he fits right in like he was meant to belong.
Fullmetal Alchemist OVA Collection (4 "Episodes")
Animation: *****
Story: ***
Music: ***
Overal: ***
I knew that FUNimation had finally grabbed this, but when I saw it in Hastings for about $12 I figured I had nothing to lose. While I wasn't completely blown away, I felt this was a decent package to fans of the series like me.
The four segments have nothing to do with each other (and little to do with the main property) but provide some fun ideas that Studio Bones decided to animate. First is a wrap party by the characters after the "filming" of Conquerer of Shamballa, proving some goofy gags. Second is a side story that treats the audience as a character, resulting in an interesting fight scene between the alchemists and homunculi (it leaves me with the impression that it was orginally part of a ride or event). Third is a curious flash-forward, showing a trio of kids (who look very much like Ed, Al, and Winry) wandering around a modern Japan before returning to their great-grandpa Elric. The fourth is a live-action segment featuring Alphone's armor as he wanders around Tokyo, trying to find Studio Bones.
I don't think I've said this on the blog yet, but I find Fullmetal Alchemist's music to be a bit bland, which was used for the OVAs. Sure, the character themes are alright and the lullabies and comic tunes strike the right chords, but all it amounts to is decent background noise that barely stands on its own. The animation is impressive, though. I'd say it's equal with what Conquerer of Shamballa presented. Slick, immersive, even when everything is chibi-styled it looks nice.
Clearly, this stuff was for the fans, as most OVAs based on bigger properties are. They expect a certain familiarity with the Fullmetal Alchemist story, specifically the anime continuity (though I would suggest that the second segment would be an ideal introduction to FMA). In any case, the set provides some fun chuckles and nostalgias for fans.
This should be good for now, but I've got quite a bit in the future. I finally finished Revolutionary Girl Utena (I was three episodes away for months!). I also wrapped up Gundam 00, which was interesting, and I've got Shangri-La almost done, so there's certainly more to cover. Here's hoping it doesn't take me a month to update this blog, eh?
9.17.2009
Struggling to get back in line! FMP Fumoffu, KuroKami, Kieli
As I expected, things got rather hectic once college picked up again, but I can still find moments to talk about my anime watching and manga reading. By the way, I finally got around to reading Hayate the Combat Butler and I AM LOVING IT!!! A total nerd fest that I imagine I'll be enjoying for quite some time now.
I've been kind of keeping an eye on the upcoming Fall Season of anime and I have to admit that I'm only really interested in Fairy Tail. I don't think that it's going to rewrite any rules of anime or anything, but it should be fun. To be honest, I'm surprised no one has jumped on it yet for an American lisence. I don't think it's the next Naruto, but I think it would still do well.
Ah, well, time to get started!
Full Metal Panic! Fumoffu (12 Episodes)
Animation: *****
Story: ****
Music: ***
Overall: ****
As I had explained before, a friend of mine insisted that I watch this and The Second Raid, so I rewatched the first series to hype myself up for them, which I have since reviewed. Now I've finished the comedy/romance side note of the series and I have to admit that it was straight-up hilarious. Taking Sousuke Sagara's hyper-military perspective on even the most mundane things makes for some very funny stuff, and it takes a lead role for this short but sweet series.
Drawing more from the funnier pieces of the manga and light novel series, there really isn't main plot so much as it is a sitcom, taking our familiar cast and watching them muck about the high school. Kaname and Sagara generally go about solving high school level problems with the expected mixed results. Tessa comes back for a stint as a high school student, effortlessly driving up Sagara's blood pressure and stress.
Of the new characters never before seen in animation, we have the Student Body President, who may not even have a name (not that he needs one) and his assistant. Let me just say that I consider the SBP to be one of the best characters in the series. Totally on board with whole Sousuke's-here-to-protect-Kaname-mission thing, he doles out assignments to Kaname (as she is the Class President for her class) and her bodyguard-cum-assistant Sousuke, ranging from helping serve rolls at lunch to resolving issues with the Martial Arts club, and the SBP does it with such style and command you can't not respect the man for all that he can do.
Despite being comedy-driven and not focused on a major plot, the animation is spectacular. Even if it's just Kaname hitting Sousuke with her paper fan yet again, it seems to be done so well that it is impossible not to get caught up in all that goes on. The well animated slapstick and antics really keep the show moving at a ridiculous pace, proving that Full Metal Panic can be just as awesome when it's telling jokes as when it was telling an intense action/thriller.
The music is the same set of pieces heard from Full Metal Panic: standard and adequate, with a few memorable tunes that excited you before. At this point, I would also like to add that the ending animation is contagiously cute. The song itself is decently punchy, but seeing chibi versions of the cast marching to it for no reason is one of my favorite parts of this series.
This series, while still relying on its source material, is a very different show from the first series. Sure, it had its moments of slapstick but they were merely bookends to get viewers into the characters and circumstances before launching into the real storyline. There really isn't any kind of major villain or even Mecha action, leaving the robots in the shop for TSR.
Fumoffu has great moments, from Sousuke training a rubgy team filled with pansies to the SBP speaking street slang to get the right message across, to Kaname voluntarily being kidnapped just to see if Sousuke will really come to her rescue. While I don't know if this will properly set me up for the latest series, it is great material that allows the viewers to sit back and relax before the next string of explosions and plot twists.
KuroKami: The Animation (23 Episodes)
Animation: *****
Story: ***
Music: ****
Overall: ****
You have to admit: Bandai had some real guts trying to pull this off. Trying to one-up the fansubbers, they helped produce the series so that it could be broadcast in three different languages within 24 hours of each other. I remember reading that the voice actors were dubbing over line-art and sketches of the show, before the color was put in and stuff. However, I'm afraid KuroKami will only be remembered as a massively ambitious and experimental because, as an anime, it comes across as rather corny.
KuroKami is about a boy named Keita whose mother died in a traffic accident. Due to this and other events, he lives alone and generally doesn't try to make friends, afraid that anyone he makes friends with will get killed. However, as he attends high school, he suddenly hears about the idea that if people meet another person who looks just like them, they will die. Putting together some of the things he remembers about his mother's accident and wonders if it's true. As if answering his question, a little girl he knows from his neighborhood happens to mention that she saw a girl just like her then crossed the road too soon and gets hit by a huge truck.
At the same time, Keita befriends a girl by the name of Kuro by giving her ramen at a ramen shop. While she's grateful, she also explains that she is on a quest to kill her older brother. She also explains that she is a Terra Guardian in charge of the Doppleliner system. Every person starts with two dopplegangers of themselves throughout the world and their terra, or life force, is divided between them. If one should die, the other two gain the dead one's terra. However it has come to the Terra Guardians' attention that someone is abusing this system, with Kuro's brother at the head.
While Keita doesn't seem to show much interest, he gets wrapped up with Kuro's battle for revenge and dies. Kuro leaps to save him the only way she knows how: by forcing Keita into a contract with her. Now as a Terra Guardian's Contractee, his concentration has an impact on Kuro's ability to battle. Before long, other evidence arrives to show that perhaps Keita's mother was caught up in this mess as well. Keita finally comes on board and Kuro takes him on a quest for the fate of the world.
There are a lot of great ideas presented here, but before long it declines into the massive rut of generic shonen-style action. People seem to battle for little to no reason and by the end, the dialogue and motivation for the characters, as they rally to fight a common evil, grows cheesier by the episode. As a result, I found myself not really trying to raise my expectations anymore. Instead, I focused on the animation.
Which was CRAZY!! While the character designs take some time to get used to, the action is unbelievable. If I had to describe it, then imagine you were watching Dragon Ball Z with a massive subwoofer and EVERYTIME some landed a punch, the whole house shook. Despite all of the attack-name shouting and superhero-like powers, everything seems to hit with great weight. You feel every crack and crunch, and quite often, I felt myself wincing. Perhaps I should be giving credit to the special effects guys. In any case, the action is the real star of this series and is worth seeing just for that.
The music may seem tacky at times, but I rather liked the whole rock/metal motif they had. It got the blood pumping as characters crashed into each other. I particularly like the second opening theme, "Trance".
Overall, it was a fun show, despite the characters being almost forgettable and the plot getting shallower as it went along. Perhaps it was a safe series for their multi-dub experiment, but I think the ride was worth it.
Kieli (2 Volumes)
Rating: **
It's really hard to review a manga series that is so short, especially with one as dynamic as Kieli where there certainly was more room to explore within its distinct world.
Taking place in some far future where people have since colonized other planets, Kieli is teenage girl going to a church school in what looks like a recreation of 1930s Europe. Supposedly several years ago, there was a horrible war where super soldiers called [immortal] were created to end the war, only to have their creators turn on them when they were no longer needed. Now, they are used as a kind of boogeyman and generally considered as a myth.
Meanwhile, Kieli goes to class, continually isolating herself because she is the only person she knows that can see ghosts, that is until she meets Harvey, a strange man who doesn't seem to want to hang around much, especially. After a small adventure in helping Kieli's ghost-roommate finally move on, she becomes infatuated with Harvey, thinking that me just might be an [immortal], decides to use her school vacation to travel with him and his companion, a ghost called Colonel with a harsh tone of voice possessing a radio. Their quest: to help the Colonel find peace.
The story doesn't have much to tell, mostly showing how this adventure helps Harvey become human again by letting this girl fall in love with him. Perhaps the light novels have more to share, I don't know, but it's hard to really get into the series when it ends so quickly. The pacing is fine and the art is nice, pleasant when it needs to be, haunting when it calls for it. But the series seems mostly content with not having much of an impact. It might make a nice movie someday, but I would have really liked to see more of the setting and scenario.
Once again, I can't promise when I'll be able to write up a new article, not that I have any decent excuse: I've recently watched the Karin anime and I'm still just a few episodes short of finishing Utena. However, I've also got a set of classes that may not seem like a lot, but they're very demanding in their own ways. I'll get back to writing as soon as I feel I can.
I've been kind of keeping an eye on the upcoming Fall Season of anime and I have to admit that I'm only really interested in Fairy Tail. I don't think that it's going to rewrite any rules of anime or anything, but it should be fun. To be honest, I'm surprised no one has jumped on it yet for an American lisence. I don't think it's the next Naruto, but I think it would still do well.
Ah, well, time to get started!
Full Metal Panic! Fumoffu (12 Episodes)
Animation: *****
Story: ****
Music: ***
Overall: ****
As I had explained before, a friend of mine insisted that I watch this and The Second Raid, so I rewatched the first series to hype myself up for them, which I have since reviewed. Now I've finished the comedy/romance side note of the series and I have to admit that it was straight-up hilarious. Taking Sousuke Sagara's hyper-military perspective on even the most mundane things makes for some very funny stuff, and it takes a lead role for this short but sweet series.
Drawing more from the funnier pieces of the manga and light novel series, there really isn't main plot so much as it is a sitcom, taking our familiar cast and watching them muck about the high school. Kaname and Sagara generally go about solving high school level problems with the expected mixed results. Tessa comes back for a stint as a high school student, effortlessly driving up Sagara's blood pressure and stress.
Of the new characters never before seen in animation, we have the Student Body President, who may not even have a name (not that he needs one) and his assistant. Let me just say that I consider the SBP to be one of the best characters in the series. Totally on board with whole Sousuke's-here-to-protect-Kaname-mission thing, he doles out assignments to Kaname (as she is the Class President for her class) and her bodyguard-cum-assistant Sousuke, ranging from helping serve rolls at lunch to resolving issues with the Martial Arts club, and the SBP does it with such style and command you can't not respect the man for all that he can do.
Despite being comedy-driven and not focused on a major plot, the animation is spectacular. Even if it's just Kaname hitting Sousuke with her paper fan yet again, it seems to be done so well that it is impossible not to get caught up in all that goes on. The well animated slapstick and antics really keep the show moving at a ridiculous pace, proving that Full Metal Panic can be just as awesome when it's telling jokes as when it was telling an intense action/thriller.
The music is the same set of pieces heard from Full Metal Panic: standard and adequate, with a few memorable tunes that excited you before. At this point, I would also like to add that the ending animation is contagiously cute. The song itself is decently punchy, but seeing chibi versions of the cast marching to it for no reason is one of my favorite parts of this series.
This series, while still relying on its source material, is a very different show from the first series. Sure, it had its moments of slapstick but they were merely bookends to get viewers into the characters and circumstances before launching into the real storyline. There really isn't any kind of major villain or even Mecha action, leaving the robots in the shop for TSR.
Fumoffu has great moments, from Sousuke training a rubgy team filled with pansies to the SBP speaking street slang to get the right message across, to Kaname voluntarily being kidnapped just to see if Sousuke will really come to her rescue. While I don't know if this will properly set me up for the latest series, it is great material that allows the viewers to sit back and relax before the next string of explosions and plot twists.
KuroKami: The Animation (23 Episodes)
Animation: *****
Story: ***
Music: ****
Overall: ****
You have to admit: Bandai had some real guts trying to pull this off. Trying to one-up the fansubbers, they helped produce the series so that it could be broadcast in three different languages within 24 hours of each other. I remember reading that the voice actors were dubbing over line-art and sketches of the show, before the color was put in and stuff. However, I'm afraid KuroKami will only be remembered as a massively ambitious and experimental because, as an anime, it comes across as rather corny.
KuroKami is about a boy named Keita whose mother died in a traffic accident. Due to this and other events, he lives alone and generally doesn't try to make friends, afraid that anyone he makes friends with will get killed. However, as he attends high school, he suddenly hears about the idea that if people meet another person who looks just like them, they will die. Putting together some of the things he remembers about his mother's accident and wonders if it's true. As if answering his question, a little girl he knows from his neighborhood happens to mention that she saw a girl just like her then crossed the road too soon and gets hit by a huge truck.
At the same time, Keita befriends a girl by the name of Kuro by giving her ramen at a ramen shop. While she's grateful, she also explains that she is on a quest to kill her older brother. She also explains that she is a Terra Guardian in charge of the Doppleliner system. Every person starts with two dopplegangers of themselves throughout the world and their terra, or life force, is divided between them. If one should die, the other two gain the dead one's terra. However it has come to the Terra Guardians' attention that someone is abusing this system, with Kuro's brother at the head.
While Keita doesn't seem to show much interest, he gets wrapped up with Kuro's battle for revenge and dies. Kuro leaps to save him the only way she knows how: by forcing Keita into a contract with her. Now as a Terra Guardian's Contractee, his concentration has an impact on Kuro's ability to battle. Before long, other evidence arrives to show that perhaps Keita's mother was caught up in this mess as well. Keita finally comes on board and Kuro takes him on a quest for the fate of the world.
There are a lot of great ideas presented here, but before long it declines into the massive rut of generic shonen-style action. People seem to battle for little to no reason and by the end, the dialogue and motivation for the characters, as they rally to fight a common evil, grows cheesier by the episode. As a result, I found myself not really trying to raise my expectations anymore. Instead, I focused on the animation.
Which was CRAZY!! While the character designs take some time to get used to, the action is unbelievable. If I had to describe it, then imagine you were watching Dragon Ball Z with a massive subwoofer and EVERYTIME some landed a punch, the whole house shook. Despite all of the attack-name shouting and superhero-like powers, everything seems to hit with great weight. You feel every crack and crunch, and quite often, I felt myself wincing. Perhaps I should be giving credit to the special effects guys. In any case, the action is the real star of this series and is worth seeing just for that.
The music may seem tacky at times, but I rather liked the whole rock/metal motif they had. It got the blood pumping as characters crashed into each other. I particularly like the second opening theme, "Trance".
Overall, it was a fun show, despite the characters being almost forgettable and the plot getting shallower as it went along. Perhaps it was a safe series for their multi-dub experiment, but I think the ride was worth it.
Kieli (2 Volumes)
Rating: **
It's really hard to review a manga series that is so short, especially with one as dynamic as Kieli where there certainly was more room to explore within its distinct world.
Taking place in some far future where people have since colonized other planets, Kieli is teenage girl going to a church school in what looks like a recreation of 1930s Europe. Supposedly several years ago, there was a horrible war where super soldiers called [immortal] were created to end the war, only to have their creators turn on them when they were no longer needed. Now, they are used as a kind of boogeyman and generally considered as a myth.
Meanwhile, Kieli goes to class, continually isolating herself because she is the only person she knows that can see ghosts, that is until she meets Harvey, a strange man who doesn't seem to want to hang around much, especially. After a small adventure in helping Kieli's ghost-roommate finally move on, she becomes infatuated with Harvey, thinking that me just might be an [immortal], decides to use her school vacation to travel with him and his companion, a ghost called Colonel with a harsh tone of voice possessing a radio. Their quest: to help the Colonel find peace.
The story doesn't have much to tell, mostly showing how this adventure helps Harvey become human again by letting this girl fall in love with him. Perhaps the light novels have more to share, I don't know, but it's hard to really get into the series when it ends so quickly. The pacing is fine and the art is nice, pleasant when it needs to be, haunting when it calls for it. But the series seems mostly content with not having much of an impact. It might make a nice movie someday, but I would have really liked to see more of the setting and scenario.
Once again, I can't promise when I'll be able to write up a new article, not that I have any decent excuse: I've recently watched the Karin anime and I'm still just a few episodes short of finishing Utena. However, I've also got a set of classes that may not seem like a lot, but they're very demanding in their own ways. I'll get back to writing as soon as I feel I can.
8.11.2009
Madness Ensues! Tsubasa, Eden Of The East, Gun Blaze West
Once again hit by the uncertainty of my future, I am not writing on time. However, despite my particular circumstances, I still have things to talk about at least for the near future. In fact, once school does start, I may get myself in a far more regular routine, compelling me to be more consistent as a whole, thus including my reviews of anime and manga.
And speaking of manga, what happened? Seriously, go check out Shonen Sunday and Sig Ikki. Are we seriously considering serialization of translated print manga for the internet? This could be huge, especially since Viz has the rights to publish Rin-Ne in English at the same time as the Japanese version. We'll see how this really goes down as I think this is massively ambitious, considering that they just lost their Shojo Beat magazine. In any case, it's something to keep an eye on.
Moving on!
Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle (52 Episodes)
Animation: ****
Story: ***
Music: *****
Overal: ***
The idea of a CLAMP manga getting an anime adaptation is certainly not something new by now, but the results seem to vary, at least for me. While I am a fan of how Card Captor Sakura and the X Movie turned out, I felt that Magic Knight Rayearth took a real weird turn at the end that really makes me wish they could have taken the manga ending instead. (I still have yet to see Chobits, xxxHolic, or Angelic Layer, though I have high hopes for the last one; it's Studio Bones after all.) So now we come to Tsubasa's adaptation.
To begin, I absolutely love the manga series. As derivative as it is, CLAMP has done some pretty inventive and exciting things with this bizarre spin on their own works. So when I decided to sit down and watch the anime, I had some pretty high expectations. While there were some highlights, I must say that I felt ultimately disappointed.
To be fair, the animation does the series justice, painting lush atmospheres and locales that set the characters where they belong. However, for an action series, the actual battles occasionally seemed stilted and unnatural, quite often satisfied with slowly panning dynamic poses and relying on flashes of light and other still pictures for the blows, and not really bothering to animate much. It's the same kind of things I found in the King of Bandits Jing series.
I also have a few problems with how the story was told. I thought that drawing from such a great manga as its source material, there would be nothing to fear, but there certainly is room for some improvement. For starters, there several moments when the show is simply satisfied with needless camera panning. It will move from one picture to another, with nothing being said or done, as if the director is simply trying to stall for time. I remember that frequently the end of an episode would simply drag on, providing nothing new to the plot or action. I guess I could label it as faulty and uneven pacing, as this was evidenced throughout the whole series. While the story arcs based on the manga are fun, the filler stories start to creep in by the end of the second series and I really get the impression that the writers couldn't come up with something new. It felt like I was being told the same story they told in the first season.
A bit of a spoiler, but the series essentially ends as a cliff-hanger. The main objective doesn't get solved by the end, but what could the animators do when the manga hadn't finished yet? At least there's room to add on (and they have with OAVs).
However, there is one bright, shining star in Tsubasa, and that's the music. This has got to be one of the most original and epic soundtracks I have ever heard. It's like a subway sandwich with a bit of everything and it tastes great because of the variety inside it. You get some techno-driven ethnic drums combined with a great sounding choir and a serious infusion of jazz. While you get the basic variety of soft pieces and action pieces, it never really loses that bizarreness, helping set the scene for Tsubasa's varied locations. However, having the music as the best part of the series can be both a good thing and a bad thing.
I guess I would recommend this series to those who haven't read the manga yet as a kind of teaser for the manga series. The anime really does nothing to add to the story or it's dramatic questions, but rather seem satisfied with giving the manga some color and an impressive soundtrack, followed by tacking on some rather pointless stories. As a whole, it's decent, but forgettable. As I've said before, I'm critical of anime adaptations the first time through, but even so, I feel no incentive to re-watch the series when I can just re-read the manga.
Eden of the East (11 Episodes)
Animation: *****
Story: ****
Music: ***
Overall: ****
Ever wonder what Lost might be like as an anime? Okay, I've never actually seen an episode of Lost, but I think I'd feel the same way I felt about Eden of the East: confused, but enjoying the ride.
The show begins with Saki Morimi on a trip from Japan to Washington D.C. when she suddenly meets with a completely naked man who is carrying a gun, a bizarre cell phone, and has completely lost his memories until just a few minutes ago. She gives him coat only to realize that her passport is still in it, so she ends up chasing him down to his apartment. In the meantime, the guy looks into his cell phone and learns that he can contact a certain person named Juiz who can grant any wish he desires. He gets back to what seems to be his apartment and finds a small armory as well as several different passports for different identities. He takes the one named Akira Takizawa and decides to burn everything else. He runs into the girl and the two of them decide to go back to Japan together, only to learn that Japan has been hit with missiles (suffering no casualties, strangely enough).
Before long, Akira learns he is a Selecao, one of twelve people chosen to help “save Japan,” whatever that may mean to these individuals. Each of them were given a cell-phone and ten billion yen for their task, the money spent for their demands to Juiz. However, one of the twelve is called the Supporter who has the right to kill any of the other members if the Supporter feels like they aren't doing their job.
All of this conspiracy-like head twisting gets further complicated by the current economics of Japan and the concept of NEETs, people who currently aren't employed, in education or training of some kind; I guess there are quite a few of them in Japan. Saki happens to one who, with a few other people, created the namesake of the series: a bizarre internet program that sort of combines Google maps with a forum. This allows people, for example, to hold up a cell phone camera and the video screen with suddenly get pop-up information for the various locations or people you may be looking at.
In short, the story's pretty convoluted, an impressive feat for only having eleven episodes. To be honest, there are still a few things that still aren't clear me, perhaps a downside of fansubs. I'm hoping now that FUNimation has the rights to the series, they'll make a dub that'll make things fit together a little better. Of course, there are still a pair of movies yet to come out to finish all the loose ends, but those are a little harder to fansub, I believe. I'll just have to be patient.
The animation is pretty slick, but that's to be expected from Production I.G. Still it's pretty neat to see how they made the characters interact with their hyper-realistic environments. The music is alright, the highlight being that the opening is actually from the band Oasis. Has that been done before: a popular western artist having a song for the opening of an anime?
As I said before, it's confusing, but a fun ride that will make you smile more than once. With all of the dark and creepy cloak-and-dagger moments you get an instantly lovable cast of realistically goofy characters. At times you'll wish the series would decide if it's a shojo manga or a Bourne rip-off (they actually allude to it in the series!), but it certainly isn't one people should miss out on.
Gun Blaze West (3 Volumes)
Rating: **
To say that I like Nobuhiro Watsuki is an understatement. I seriously consider Rurouni Kenshin to be the greatest Japanese comic ever made. It's a great epic story with great characters, great pacing, and a good sense of action. However, since then, his works have been lacking. Gun Blaze West was his next attempt and, given some of Watsuki's liner notes, you can tell that things weren't going well from the start.
Gun Blaze West basically takes the standard Shonen action/adventure formula and plugs it into a wild west setting. You get a spunky hero with unlimited potential, a mentor to help him get started, a pair of companions to keep him in check, and a cast of villains and opponents to test his strength against. The fact that all of this takes place in the wild west quickly becomes its best quality. Instead of martial arts or chi blasts, you get guns and some good old-fashioned brawling.
The story kills out just as things really get going and the point of Gun Blaze West is made fairly clear. Apparently the series got canceled rather quickly, but Watsuki blames himself for this as he explains that he was doing everything by the seat of his pants and with a bad illness on top of that. To be honest, I don't know if we miss much. While the idea of Naruto with a six-shooter may seem appealing (and Watsuki did have some pretty interesting character designs along the way), it's clear that he's done better work. He lost the decent pacing that he had (a problem that I think he continued with Buso Renkin; that series moves way too fast for its own good) and his characters don't have the fresh chemistry between each other like in Kenshin.
Simply a sputter of bland story-telling that looks rather pretty, I think I can only recommend this to Watsuki fans like myself and anyone who is curious about a Japanese perspective of Western Films.
Ended on a bit of a downer, didn't I? Oh well, not everything in otaku-dom can be warm-fuzzies and robots. I'm not sure when I'll get the next article up, but I'm fairly certain that I'll have Kurokami and Full Metal Panic! Fumoffu finished by then. I've also got Revolutionary Girl Utena almost finished and a few other short manga series on my list, so I can only blame myself for not getting things posted.
Just as an after-thought, is anyone else getting a bit overwhelmed by all of the anime and manga that's hitting the web? I brought up Viz's manga sites earlier, but when I look over FUNimation's video portal or CrunchyRoll, the number of titles available on those sites is absolutely baffling. Anime is hitting the internet hard and I think we need to be right there with them so they don't regret all of the efforts they've made.
And speaking of manga, what happened? Seriously, go check out Shonen Sunday and Sig Ikki. Are we seriously considering serialization of translated print manga for the internet? This could be huge, especially since Viz has the rights to publish Rin-Ne in English at the same time as the Japanese version. We'll see how this really goes down as I think this is massively ambitious, considering that they just lost their Shojo Beat magazine. In any case, it's something to keep an eye on.
Moving on!
Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle (52 Episodes)
Animation: ****
Story: ***
Music: *****
Overal: ***
The idea of a CLAMP manga getting an anime adaptation is certainly not something new by now, but the results seem to vary, at least for me. While I am a fan of how Card Captor Sakura and the X Movie turned out, I felt that Magic Knight Rayearth took a real weird turn at the end that really makes me wish they could have taken the manga ending instead. (I still have yet to see Chobits, xxxHolic, or Angelic Layer, though I have high hopes for the last one; it's Studio Bones after all.) So now we come to Tsubasa's adaptation.
To begin, I absolutely love the manga series. As derivative as it is, CLAMP has done some pretty inventive and exciting things with this bizarre spin on their own works. So when I decided to sit down and watch the anime, I had some pretty high expectations. While there were some highlights, I must say that I felt ultimately disappointed.
To be fair, the animation does the series justice, painting lush atmospheres and locales that set the characters where they belong. However, for an action series, the actual battles occasionally seemed stilted and unnatural, quite often satisfied with slowly panning dynamic poses and relying on flashes of light and other still pictures for the blows, and not really bothering to animate much. It's the same kind of things I found in the King of Bandits Jing series.
I also have a few problems with how the story was told. I thought that drawing from such a great manga as its source material, there would be nothing to fear, but there certainly is room for some improvement. For starters, there several moments when the show is simply satisfied with needless camera panning. It will move from one picture to another, with nothing being said or done, as if the director is simply trying to stall for time. I remember that frequently the end of an episode would simply drag on, providing nothing new to the plot or action. I guess I could label it as faulty and uneven pacing, as this was evidenced throughout the whole series. While the story arcs based on the manga are fun, the filler stories start to creep in by the end of the second series and I really get the impression that the writers couldn't come up with something new. It felt like I was being told the same story they told in the first season.
A bit of a spoiler, but the series essentially ends as a cliff-hanger. The main objective doesn't get solved by the end, but what could the animators do when the manga hadn't finished yet? At least there's room to add on (and they have with OAVs).
However, there is one bright, shining star in Tsubasa, and that's the music. This has got to be one of the most original and epic soundtracks I have ever heard. It's like a subway sandwich with a bit of everything and it tastes great because of the variety inside it. You get some techno-driven ethnic drums combined with a great sounding choir and a serious infusion of jazz. While you get the basic variety of soft pieces and action pieces, it never really loses that bizarreness, helping set the scene for Tsubasa's varied locations. However, having the music as the best part of the series can be both a good thing and a bad thing.
I guess I would recommend this series to those who haven't read the manga yet as a kind of teaser for the manga series. The anime really does nothing to add to the story or it's dramatic questions, but rather seem satisfied with giving the manga some color and an impressive soundtrack, followed by tacking on some rather pointless stories. As a whole, it's decent, but forgettable. As I've said before, I'm critical of anime adaptations the first time through, but even so, I feel no incentive to re-watch the series when I can just re-read the manga.
Eden of the East (11 Episodes)
Animation: *****
Story: ****
Music: ***
Overall: ****
Ever wonder what Lost might be like as an anime? Okay, I've never actually seen an episode of Lost, but I think I'd feel the same way I felt about Eden of the East: confused, but enjoying the ride.
The show begins with Saki Morimi on a trip from Japan to Washington D.C. when she suddenly meets with a completely naked man who is carrying a gun, a bizarre cell phone, and has completely lost his memories until just a few minutes ago. She gives him coat only to realize that her passport is still in it, so she ends up chasing him down to his apartment. In the meantime, the guy looks into his cell phone and learns that he can contact a certain person named Juiz who can grant any wish he desires. He gets back to what seems to be his apartment and finds a small armory as well as several different passports for different identities. He takes the one named Akira Takizawa and decides to burn everything else. He runs into the girl and the two of them decide to go back to Japan together, only to learn that Japan has been hit with missiles (suffering no casualties, strangely enough).
Before long, Akira learns he is a Selecao, one of twelve people chosen to help “save Japan,” whatever that may mean to these individuals. Each of them were given a cell-phone and ten billion yen for their task, the money spent for their demands to Juiz. However, one of the twelve is called the Supporter who has the right to kill any of the other members if the Supporter feels like they aren't doing their job.
All of this conspiracy-like head twisting gets further complicated by the current economics of Japan and the concept of NEETs, people who currently aren't employed, in education or training of some kind; I guess there are quite a few of them in Japan. Saki happens to one who, with a few other people, created the namesake of the series: a bizarre internet program that sort of combines Google maps with a forum. This allows people, for example, to hold up a cell phone camera and the video screen with suddenly get pop-up information for the various locations or people you may be looking at.
In short, the story's pretty convoluted, an impressive feat for only having eleven episodes. To be honest, there are still a few things that still aren't clear me, perhaps a downside of fansubs. I'm hoping now that FUNimation has the rights to the series, they'll make a dub that'll make things fit together a little better. Of course, there are still a pair of movies yet to come out to finish all the loose ends, but those are a little harder to fansub, I believe. I'll just have to be patient.
The animation is pretty slick, but that's to be expected from Production I.G. Still it's pretty neat to see how they made the characters interact with their hyper-realistic environments. The music is alright, the highlight being that the opening is actually from the band Oasis. Has that been done before: a popular western artist having a song for the opening of an anime?
As I said before, it's confusing, but a fun ride that will make you smile more than once. With all of the dark and creepy cloak-and-dagger moments you get an instantly lovable cast of realistically goofy characters. At times you'll wish the series would decide if it's a shojo manga or a Bourne rip-off (they actually allude to it in the series!), but it certainly isn't one people should miss out on.
Gun Blaze West (3 Volumes)
Rating: **
To say that I like Nobuhiro Watsuki is an understatement. I seriously consider Rurouni Kenshin to be the greatest Japanese comic ever made. It's a great epic story with great characters, great pacing, and a good sense of action. However, since then, his works have been lacking. Gun Blaze West was his next attempt and, given some of Watsuki's liner notes, you can tell that things weren't going well from the start.
Gun Blaze West basically takes the standard Shonen action/adventure formula and plugs it into a wild west setting. You get a spunky hero with unlimited potential, a mentor to help him get started, a pair of companions to keep him in check, and a cast of villains and opponents to test his strength against. The fact that all of this takes place in the wild west quickly becomes its best quality. Instead of martial arts or chi blasts, you get guns and some good old-fashioned brawling.
The story kills out just as things really get going and the point of Gun Blaze West is made fairly clear. Apparently the series got canceled rather quickly, but Watsuki blames himself for this as he explains that he was doing everything by the seat of his pants and with a bad illness on top of that. To be honest, I don't know if we miss much. While the idea of Naruto with a six-shooter may seem appealing (and Watsuki did have some pretty interesting character designs along the way), it's clear that he's done better work. He lost the decent pacing that he had (a problem that I think he continued with Buso Renkin; that series moves way too fast for its own good) and his characters don't have the fresh chemistry between each other like in Kenshin.
Simply a sputter of bland story-telling that looks rather pretty, I think I can only recommend this to Watsuki fans like myself and anyone who is curious about a Japanese perspective of Western Films.
Ended on a bit of a downer, didn't I? Oh well, not everything in otaku-dom can be warm-fuzzies and robots. I'm not sure when I'll get the next article up, but I'm fairly certain that I'll have Kurokami and Full Metal Panic! Fumoffu finished by then. I've also got Revolutionary Girl Utena almost finished and a few other short manga series on my list, so I can only blame myself for not getting things posted.
Just as an after-thought, is anyone else getting a bit overwhelmed by all of the anime and manga that's hitting the web? I brought up Viz's manga sites earlier, but when I look over FUNimation's video portal or CrunchyRoll, the number of titles available on those sites is absolutely baffling. Anime is hitting the internet hard and I think we need to be right there with them so they don't regret all of the efforts they've made.
7.27.2009
Missed A Week, But I'm Back! Tenchi, Hyakko, Fruits Basket
Waagh! Sorry I'm late! I had a really apathetic week last week and things got kind of bad. I even had this article planned in my head and I just decided not to write it. I'm going to blame hayfever. It's a good scapegoat. In any case, no more excuses. I can do this! So here we go.
Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-Ohki OVA Set 3 (7 Episodes)
Animation: ****
Story: ****
Music: ***
Overall: ***
The Tenchi franchise is about as old as the hills now and the formula is pretty much the same here, just simply picking up where the first two sets of OVAs left off. Tenchi, in his house filled with hot alien girls, is suddenly visited by even more hot alien girls. What starts off as Tenchi's long lost family pouring in and telling him he's already engaged turns into a crisis that could destroy the universe. Basic Tenchi stuff and yet quite fun if you've already enjoyed everything leading up to this series as I have since it was broadcasted on Toonami.
However, I do have a few complaints. I don't talk much about the whole issue of subs and dubs and that kind of thing, but here the dub bothered me. It wasn't that the dub was bad as it was that FUNimation didn't (or couldn't) get some of the original voice actors and that was a little depressing. I had heard that they were using a different voice for Ryoko, but I figured that a sexy space pirate wouldn't be hard to recreate, and I was wrong. Not that the voice was bad, but the original voice actress who played Ryoko certainly was better. Mihoshi's voice actress was different as well, but I didn't care as much. Airhead is airhead and I've never cared much for Mihoshi anyway. One thing that did puzzle me is how they got the original voice again for Tenchi, but didn't have him do Tenchi's grandfather, Katsuhito, like he did originally. Oh well.
My other complaint actually is in the animation. Don't get me wrong, it was still good, but it wasn't the same quality and smoothness that the original OVAs had. Even if they're older, they certainly were slick and had a lot of fluid motion, whereas this third set has the standard stickiness you expect from television anime. I thought OVAs were supposed to by better in the animation department.
It's still a fun series, though. I don't know if it's ideal for someone to pick it up on its own; they do spend a lot of time referring to material brought up in the earlier series. Sure, the first episode is sort of a recap, but there's still other details you wouldn't really get unless you had watched the series from the beginning. At least we don't have to wait and buy each episode individually!
Hyakko (13 Episodes)
Animation: ****
Story: ****
Music: ****
Overall: *****
WILL SOMEONE PLEASE LICENSE THIS!?!?!?!?!??!?!?!?!
. . .
Lemme back up. When the Anime News Network was doing their Anime preview for (geez, I think it was) last fall, they didn't seem to care much for Hyakko. It was four high school girls simply being the kind of silly you'd find in anime. Yet, as I picked which series I was going to try to follow, I couldn't get it out of my mind and I decided to give it a shot.
I have since been left on the ground rolling in laughter. This series absolutely KILLS me! I don't know if it just fits in with my sense of humor or what, but I loved almost every minute of this series (I'll get to those other parts later)!! The character design is immediately striking, the character interactions are incredibly dynamic, and the music keeps everything pumping full of life and energy. Even when they toss in a few anime in-jokes, the show doesn't necessarily expect you to get them, which allows you to join in with the rest of the cast in being pleasantly baffled. Of course, when you do get it, it's just as great.
The premise is simply enough: the campus is one of those K-12 schools, but the first character you meet is Ayumi who transferred in just for high school, which becomes apparent when she gets lost five minutes into the first episode. Plagued with a timid nature, she tries to find friends but can't find the courage, so when she stumbles across Natsumi, the snooty girl, Ayumi can barely get across that she could use some help, only to learn that, despite being a student at this school since the beginning, Natsumi is lost, too. As they wander around, they come across Torako leaping out of a building as plan to not loose her own sense of direction because she and her friend Suzume are lost as well. Torako is the gung-ho reckless type (almost like a shonen anime hero) and Suzume fills the personality-of-a-alien-robot type. From here, the four girls (who are all in the same class, as it turns out) become close friends simply by happenstance and it's great to see them clash against each other over this and that. Mostly, Natsumi practicality compels her to scorn Torako for every nonsensical thing she does while Ayumi trembles in indecision and Suzume eats everything. They also seem to be the central focus as they befriend/harass the other girls in their class.
My only criticism is what happens at the end of the series. After being a rather off-the-wall comedy, it suddenly strikes a large vein of seriousness that almost seems uncharacteristic. While the series does a good job of diving fairly deep into the various characters' problems and personalities, it suddenly dives a little too deep into Torako's family life and troubles which are rather complex and dark in comparison. And the final episode is a little disorienting as it takes everything back to before the series got started. Maybe if I had read the manga, this whole thing would make more sense.
That aside, the series was a lot of fun and I would love it if some company could pick it up and bring it here. I don't care if it's just a subtitles-only complete box set a la Media Blasters (though I wouldn't turn down a dub if someone feels like it would be worthwhile), I just want this series on DVD without having to pay through the nose for an import. I really wouldn't know where to look anyways.
I may not have seen every anime comedy under the sun, but I enjoyed this and would recommend it to anyone who likes their comedy a little on the off-beat side.
Fruits Basket (23 Volumes)
Rating: ***
I reviewed the anime here on this blog before and found it to be a fun, light-hearted comedy concerning a rather frightening family. However, the anime could only go so far as the manga hadn't finished yet, so they decided to make their own ending, bringing everything to a reasonable close.
Fruits Basket is a fairly well known property by now, as it is the number shojo manga in America (or is that just TokyoPop hyping things up?). I imagine most everyone is familiar with the premise by now, and if not, I've done a decent enough job with the anime review that I don't feel like re-typing it.
In comparison to the anime, the manga starts out just as light-hearted, but then dives deep in rather serious situations and material. It spends a rather long time on each of the other zodiac members that I wouldn't really consider to be main characters, sort of like how Kare Kano got away from the main couple for some of those later graphic novels. However, to Fruits Basket's credit, it still focuses on Tohru and her interactions with the various members of the Sohma family, even if they seem tangential. In fact, as the series progresses, it seems to wax more and more philosophical, almost making it seem long-winded at times.
Toward the end, Fruits Basket remembers that shojo manga tend to have romantic parts as well, and Tohru finally decides she in love with one of the guys (I won't say who simply because I didn't think it would be him, so I'll leave it a surprise for those who haven't read it) and helps him over come his Zodiac curse.
After running for 23 volumes, we finally have the happy ending we've been waiting for all this time. Things get sorted out, negativity is replaced with smiles, and all is well. It just took a really long, roundabout way of getting there. Maybe it was just the release schedule of the volumes from TokyoPop, I don't know. However, I feel satisfied with how the series went as a whole and I don't think it as a waste of my time. (Again, their version of Cinderella for their school play is the most hilarious play-in-a-manga I've ever seen.)
Well, as I warned, things may get more complicated as I get closer to the fall semester, but I've already got a plan for next week's article: I'm almost finished with Eden Of The East (wow, what a trip) and I've got the rest of Tsubasa Reservior Chronicle handy. Also, there are a few short manga collections that I could have finished by then as well, so at least I'll have something to write about.
I wonder when One Piece will become available online again with FUNimation . . . .
Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-Ohki OVA Set 3 (7 Episodes)
Animation: ****
Story: ****
Music: ***
Overall: ***
The Tenchi franchise is about as old as the hills now and the formula is pretty much the same here, just simply picking up where the first two sets of OVAs left off. Tenchi, in his house filled with hot alien girls, is suddenly visited by even more hot alien girls. What starts off as Tenchi's long lost family pouring in and telling him he's already engaged turns into a crisis that could destroy the universe. Basic Tenchi stuff and yet quite fun if you've already enjoyed everything leading up to this series as I have since it was broadcasted on Toonami.
However, I do have a few complaints. I don't talk much about the whole issue of subs and dubs and that kind of thing, but here the dub bothered me. It wasn't that the dub was bad as it was that FUNimation didn't (or couldn't) get some of the original voice actors and that was a little depressing. I had heard that they were using a different voice for Ryoko, but I figured that a sexy space pirate wouldn't be hard to recreate, and I was wrong. Not that the voice was bad, but the original voice actress who played Ryoko certainly was better. Mihoshi's voice actress was different as well, but I didn't care as much. Airhead is airhead and I've never cared much for Mihoshi anyway. One thing that did puzzle me is how they got the original voice again for Tenchi, but didn't have him do Tenchi's grandfather, Katsuhito, like he did originally. Oh well.
My other complaint actually is in the animation. Don't get me wrong, it was still good, but it wasn't the same quality and smoothness that the original OVAs had. Even if they're older, they certainly were slick and had a lot of fluid motion, whereas this third set has the standard stickiness you expect from television anime. I thought OVAs were supposed to by better in the animation department.
It's still a fun series, though. I don't know if it's ideal for someone to pick it up on its own; they do spend a lot of time referring to material brought up in the earlier series. Sure, the first episode is sort of a recap, but there's still other details you wouldn't really get unless you had watched the series from the beginning. At least we don't have to wait and buy each episode individually!
Hyakko (13 Episodes)
Animation: ****
Story: ****
Music: ****
Overall: *****
WILL SOMEONE PLEASE LICENSE THIS!?!?!?!?!??!?!?!?!
. . .
Lemme back up. When the Anime News Network was doing their Anime preview for (geez, I think it was) last fall, they didn't seem to care much for Hyakko. It was four high school girls simply being the kind of silly you'd find in anime. Yet, as I picked which series I was going to try to follow, I couldn't get it out of my mind and I decided to give it a shot.
I have since been left on the ground rolling in laughter. This series absolutely KILLS me! I don't know if it just fits in with my sense of humor or what, but I loved almost every minute of this series (I'll get to those other parts later)!! The character design is immediately striking, the character interactions are incredibly dynamic, and the music keeps everything pumping full of life and energy. Even when they toss in a few anime in-jokes, the show doesn't necessarily expect you to get them, which allows you to join in with the rest of the cast in being pleasantly baffled. Of course, when you do get it, it's just as great.
The premise is simply enough: the campus is one of those K-12 schools, but the first character you meet is Ayumi who transferred in just for high school, which becomes apparent when she gets lost five minutes into the first episode. Plagued with a timid nature, she tries to find friends but can't find the courage, so when she stumbles across Natsumi, the snooty girl, Ayumi can barely get across that she could use some help, only to learn that, despite being a student at this school since the beginning, Natsumi is lost, too. As they wander around, they come across Torako leaping out of a building as plan to not loose her own sense of direction because she and her friend Suzume are lost as well. Torako is the gung-ho reckless type (almost like a shonen anime hero) and Suzume fills the personality-of-a-alien-robot type. From here, the four girls (who are all in the same class, as it turns out) become close friends simply by happenstance and it's great to see them clash against each other over this and that. Mostly, Natsumi practicality compels her to scorn Torako for every nonsensical thing she does while Ayumi trembles in indecision and Suzume eats everything. They also seem to be the central focus as they befriend/harass the other girls in their class.
My only criticism is what happens at the end of the series. After being a rather off-the-wall comedy, it suddenly strikes a large vein of seriousness that almost seems uncharacteristic. While the series does a good job of diving fairly deep into the various characters' problems and personalities, it suddenly dives a little too deep into Torako's family life and troubles which are rather complex and dark in comparison. And the final episode is a little disorienting as it takes everything back to before the series got started. Maybe if I had read the manga, this whole thing would make more sense.
That aside, the series was a lot of fun and I would love it if some company could pick it up and bring it here. I don't care if it's just a subtitles-only complete box set a la Media Blasters (though I wouldn't turn down a dub if someone feels like it would be worthwhile), I just want this series on DVD without having to pay through the nose for an import. I really wouldn't know where to look anyways.
I may not have seen every anime comedy under the sun, but I enjoyed this and would recommend it to anyone who likes their comedy a little on the off-beat side.
Fruits Basket (23 Volumes)
Rating: ***
I reviewed the anime here on this blog before and found it to be a fun, light-hearted comedy concerning a rather frightening family. However, the anime could only go so far as the manga hadn't finished yet, so they decided to make their own ending, bringing everything to a reasonable close.
Fruits Basket is a fairly well known property by now, as it is the number shojo manga in America (or is that just TokyoPop hyping things up?). I imagine most everyone is familiar with the premise by now, and if not, I've done a decent enough job with the anime review that I don't feel like re-typing it.
In comparison to the anime, the manga starts out just as light-hearted, but then dives deep in rather serious situations and material. It spends a rather long time on each of the other zodiac members that I wouldn't really consider to be main characters, sort of like how Kare Kano got away from the main couple for some of those later graphic novels. However, to Fruits Basket's credit, it still focuses on Tohru and her interactions with the various members of the Sohma family, even if they seem tangential. In fact, as the series progresses, it seems to wax more and more philosophical, almost making it seem long-winded at times.
Toward the end, Fruits Basket remembers that shojo manga tend to have romantic parts as well, and Tohru finally decides she in love with one of the guys (I won't say who simply because I didn't think it would be him, so I'll leave it a surprise for those who haven't read it) and helps him over come his Zodiac curse.
After running for 23 volumes, we finally have the happy ending we've been waiting for all this time. Things get sorted out, negativity is replaced with smiles, and all is well. It just took a really long, roundabout way of getting there. Maybe it was just the release schedule of the volumes from TokyoPop, I don't know. However, I feel satisfied with how the series went as a whole and I don't think it as a waste of my time. (Again, their version of Cinderella for their school play is the most hilarious play-in-a-manga I've ever seen.)
Well, as I warned, things may get more complicated as I get closer to the fall semester, but I've already got a plan for next week's article: I'm almost finished with Eden Of The East (wow, what a trip) and I've got the rest of Tsubasa Reservior Chronicle handy. Also, there are a few short manga collections that I could have finished by then as well, so at least I'll have something to write about.
I wonder when One Piece will become available online again with FUNimation . . . .
7.12.2009
Summer Blues! Code Geass, Tower Of Druaga, Astro Boy
I apologize for not getting this posted yesterday, but the pollen of the world decided to give a massive headache along with an itchy nose, and I'm afraid to say that things may not get better, according to the big picture. While it has been great to watch all of this anime, my summer is starting to turn back towards worrying about school, which means finding tuition money and then spending time on homework or, in short, less time for anime. I don't know how often I'll be able to update from here on out, but I'll try to be as often as I feel I can.
At least I've got a few titles to get things started for now.
Code Geass: Lelouch Of The Rebellion (25 Episodes)
Code Geass: Lelouch Of The Rebellion R2 (25 Episodes)
Animation: *****
Story: ****
Music: ***
Overall: ****
Yes, I have finally finished all of Code Geass and, boy, is my brain tired. I remember when this series was first starting to get all of sorts of attention from all sorts of fans and I thought I'd give it a shot when it rolled around on Adult Swim's online video player and found myself ensnared in a tangle of plots that I could pull my eyes away from.
In an alternate but not too distant future, the Empire of Britannia (located primarily in North America) begins expanding its territory across the world, including Japan, taking it over completely and turning into Area 11. The people there are now called Elevens and treated as a lower caste by the Britannians. Lelouch is a Brittanian prince who is living as a high school student in Japan under the surname of Lamperouge in order to hide from potential assassinations. However, he still holds a personal grudge in his heart against whoever killed his mother in an assassination, a trauma that left Lelouch's little sister, who is “hiding” in Japan with him, blind. Lelouch figures that it's someone else within the Brittania family and vows to get revenge, but having been dumped in Japan, he feels powerless to do so.
Meanwhile, even though Japan has been a part of Brittania for 10 years, there are still resistance groups trying to fight for their Japanese heritage. They get wind of some chemical weapons are being transported and try to prevent the Empire from using them. Lelouch happens upon this act of terrorism and decides to follow up on what's going on, thinking that he can make a dent in Brittania. However, instead of finding chemical weapons, he finds an incapacitated girl in green hair and tries to take her to safety away from the terrorists violence. Along the way, he runs into Suzaku Kururugi, his childhood friend and native Japanese, fighting as a soldier for Britannia. Without having time to catch up, they try to get out of danger, but end up getting separated again, with Lelouch being caught by a platoon of soldiers. They fire, but the green-haired girl suddenly jumps in front, saving Lelouch's life. As the green lies on the ground, she suddenly starts talking about giving Lelouch “power.” Finding himself up against a wall, he accepts and is granted the power of Geass, where upon eye-to-eye contact, Lelouch can alter the will of anyone. He uses his power to escape the soldiers, by ordering them all to commit suicide, and begins to help the terrorists in their efforts against the Empire, later becoming their leader under the guise of Zero, a masked hero for justice. He begins to figure that, with his own cunning, his new power, and the terrorists' resources, he can finally topple Brittania and find out who killed his mother.
What happens from then on is a convoluted tale that warps between political intrigue, high school antics, supernatural powers, and personal anguish, as Lelouch and the others feel the weight of their new responsibilities and try to defeat their enemies and fears. The green-haired-girl, simply named as C2, returns as an immortal being capable of granting Geass power and willing to Lelouch with his rebellion as long as he fulfills his end of the contract, a detail that remains unrevealed for quite some time. Suzaku ends up climbing through the ranks of the Brittanian military, quickly ending up as a test subject for a special proto-type mech.
Oh, yeah. There's robots throughout the whole thing. All the battles are straight-up mecha army action.
Code Geass is a very ambitious story, trying to weave together so many plot threads and still make sense, and, to its credit, it mostly succeeds. While my head spun with each plot twist, each piece finds its resting place by the end of the long series and felt satisfied by the end. Things went well, even if I felt like everything was stumbling through mud from time to time.
The animation was incredible, not only with the vivid scenery and memorable character designs by CLAMP, but with the action and combat as well, a crucial element for mecha anime. The robots all seem to have wheels on their feet, so the battles feel like over-the-top roller derbies with guns, and somehow they made it work. The music was more of a downer. It had its moments, establishing easy-to-recognize themes when things worked or didn't work in the story, but it didn't stand out much and I felt more could have been done with it. Even the opening and ending themes were rather mediocre.
When I got a few episodes in, I gathered the sentiment that this was going to be Death Note but with mecha instead of mind games. Sunrise has had all sorts of experience with their Gundam franchise in combining a political drama with robots and so adding in this supernatural twist could make or break the series. While it stumbled around getting there, it did come together in the end, resulting in one of the most renowned series Sunrise has produced (I think it even won some awards in Japan a couple of times). In the end, my sentiment was right. Code Geass is Death Note with robots. You have webs of character relations, sudden plot twists, supernatural surprises (especially when Lelouch runs into other Geass users!), and a wealth of memorable moments that really makes this title stand out. I can now see what all of the hubbub was for and I don't regret it.
The Tower of Druaga: The Aegis Of Uruk (12 Episodes)
The Tower of Druaga: The Sword Of Uruk (12 Episodes)
Animation: ****
Story: ****
Music: ****
Overall: ****
The Tower of Druaga was an old Japanese arcade game where the heroes had to climb a 60 level tower in order to save the world. I don't think it ever made it to America, but it was quite a hit in Japan has since spawned a handful of games in the same world. In this anime series, Gonzo takes that game and turns it into a very entertaining romp through the tower and the personal struggles of those who climb it.
The story primarily revolves around Jil, a young Climber, who is sincere about getting to the top and defeating the great demon Druaga. However, the other Climbers don't want to listen because they're satisfied with how much money they can make Climbing the tower. He tries to join his older brother Neeba's group, only to be kicked out for his incompetence. He finally gets his own party, consisting of Ahmey, a female spear-wielder, Kaaya, a cheerful priestess, Melt, an eccentric mage, and Coopa, Melt's personal assistant that happens to have her own bag of tricks. They all decide to follow Jil up the tower in order to defeat the evil that lives at that top.
However, as they climb the tower, they begin to notice some of the connections between the tower and the condition of the king of the land, Gilgamesh, who supposedly defeated the tower the last time. Because it has come back and the past is slowly being revealed, the tower's true purpose becomes revealed and the heroes have to find the truth on top of it all.
While all of this is a very engaging Babylonian fantasy epic with it's own innovations (Melt's magic is swinging clubs like he's golfing, making Coopa a sort of caddy for him; it's brilliant), it is more than willing to take some time to put its tongue in its own cheek. The first episode is almost entirely a dream, spoofing itself and other action series and fantasy tropes (even going so far as a Monty Python reference and a sudden shift into Gurren Lagann mode) and not developing very much plot. Later on, the characters stumble into a series of bizarre traps that the heroes spend an entire episode walking into. They even take the time to send Jil into a life-size reenactment of the original video game, the other heroes controlling him with a joystick and buttons and having to restart every time something goes wrong. The moments of comedy brighten things significantly. Even if very little progression is made, it helps the viewers get to know the characters.
The second part of the series is much more serious, though, as things turn uglier, though it does take time to show the ski resort Melt builds within the tower. However, as it builds suspense and goes deeper into the secrets of the tower, I felt that the final showdown was rather light-weight compared to all the momentum it had been building. While I won't go into detail for the sake of those who haven't seen it, I thought there were some darker themes and heavier material into which they could have delved. Instead, they decide to pass over it and simply bring an end to everything.
The animation was great. Having many characters involved for massive battles with monsters and other Climbers went well for the most part. The biggest problem I had how the CG elements didn't blend into the 2D animation as well as it could have. It stood out and seemed somewhat distracting. Gonzo has always messed around with combining 2D with 3D, but they seemed to make it work so well ten years ago with Blue Submarine No. 6. It wasn't a major bother in Tower, but it was reoccuring. The music was nice, drawing on the themes from the video game but giving them a Lord of the Rings quality by giving them an orchestral feel. The opening and ending themes weren't bad either. Also, it should be noted that I watched this series subbed, for once. It'll be interesting how the series will sound after FUNimation dubs it.
The Tower of Druaga was a fun ride, even if it lost some steam at the end. And it's still available online (Thank you, CrunchyRoll!) so go watch it. It's worth it. It even led me to a discovery. I was in my local Hastings with some money to burn and I stumbled across the PS2 game The Nightmare of Druaga. Not only was it in the used bin for only four dollars, it was still shrink-wrapped after I tore off the used-wrap Hastings puts on its used materials. I primarily picked up simply because I was watching Druaga at the time. The game happens to be a wonderfully merciless dungeon hack that I imagine I'll be playing for years to come. I've become a fan of the Druaga series and look forward to where it'll pop up in the future.
Astro Boy (23 Volumes)
Rating: ***
Osamu Tezuka's genius has gone unrecognized lately, in my opinion. Especially in America. While I'm sure that most anime and manga fans are aware that he brought those two very mediums to the heights of popularity they enjoy now, they fail to realize that he himself is a great writer and artist, full of his own impressive ideas. Maybe some time I'll talk about his Phoenix series.
I recently finished Dark Horse's run of Tezuka's breakout hit, Astro Boy. He had some success with Kimba but Astro Boy is what got everyone's attention back then and the title propelled Tezuka to be the Godfather of Manga as he is known today. However, reading it now is a bit of a challenge. The layout and narrative style haven't aged well, coming across as very wordy and thick for a simple action series. Most of the time, Astro Boy is simply caught up in an evil plot or scheme and has to beat up the bad guys in order to save the day. General old-school superhero story-telling. This leaves the reader with a heavily episodic series that rarely refers to other stories. The particular collection that Dark Horse has translated doesn't even have the volumes in any kind of chronological or narrative order. You could pick up any volume and begin reading without having to read the others before it (except for two or three that collect a newspaper run, but even then, the story would be hard to follow).
So why do I give Astro Boy 3 stars? Well, even though Tezuka had to keep the story simple and action driven to please his editors, throughout his stories he was able to delve into more complicated material, even if it was merely subtext. The story begins with a brilliant robotics scientist named Dr. Tenma. However, he was so caught up with work that he neglected his own son. When his son got into a car accident, he felt the need to turn his life around, so he coerced the robotics department to help him create a robot version of his son and succeeded. Unfortunately, Dr. Tenma grew upset that the robot couldn't grow like a normal child and abandoned it, too, going into seclusion. Sometime later, Dr. Ochanamizu found the robot's body and rebuilt him with super powers, turning him into Astro Boy, who would eventually become the poster child for the ideology that robots deserve to have rights just like the humans.
I find it interesting that Tezuka is a contemporary of Isaac Asimov and his three rules of robotics. While they have their similarities, it's interesting to see how each of them consider the possibilities of robots with progressive artificial intelligence, and that's what makes Astro Boy such a remarkable work. The out-dated elements of the story can be compensated by the speculation and vision Tezuka offers for our future.
As for what to expect in future columns, I don't know what to tell you. I was expecting Shangri-La (which is has been pretty cool) to finish with 13 episodes but it's probably going to finish in the mid-twenties now. I do have Hyakko and Eden of the East fansubs sitting on my computer that I could finish up quite quickly. There are a couple of other anime series that I could really dive into that are just sitting around.
Another possibility may not be reviews of a specific title but a focus on broader topics within anime and manga. I'm not terribly industry savvy, but I could delve a bit into that as well. I'm just not sure. You'll just have to come back and check out what I've got to say!
At least I've got a few titles to get things started for now.
Code Geass: Lelouch Of The Rebellion (25 Episodes)
Code Geass: Lelouch Of The Rebellion R2 (25 Episodes)
Animation: *****
Story: ****
Music: ***
Overall: ****
Yes, I have finally finished all of Code Geass and, boy, is my brain tired. I remember when this series was first starting to get all of sorts of attention from all sorts of fans and I thought I'd give it a shot when it rolled around on Adult Swim's online video player and found myself ensnared in a tangle of plots that I could pull my eyes away from.
In an alternate but not too distant future, the Empire of Britannia (located primarily in North America) begins expanding its territory across the world, including Japan, taking it over completely and turning into Area 11. The people there are now called Elevens and treated as a lower caste by the Britannians. Lelouch is a Brittanian prince who is living as a high school student in Japan under the surname of Lamperouge in order to hide from potential assassinations. However, he still holds a personal grudge in his heart against whoever killed his mother in an assassination, a trauma that left Lelouch's little sister, who is “hiding” in Japan with him, blind. Lelouch figures that it's someone else within the Brittania family and vows to get revenge, but having been dumped in Japan, he feels powerless to do so.
Meanwhile, even though Japan has been a part of Brittania for 10 years, there are still resistance groups trying to fight for their Japanese heritage. They get wind of some chemical weapons are being transported and try to prevent the Empire from using them. Lelouch happens upon this act of terrorism and decides to follow up on what's going on, thinking that he can make a dent in Brittania. However, instead of finding chemical weapons, he finds an incapacitated girl in green hair and tries to take her to safety away from the terrorists violence. Along the way, he runs into Suzaku Kururugi, his childhood friend and native Japanese, fighting as a soldier for Britannia. Without having time to catch up, they try to get out of danger, but end up getting separated again, with Lelouch being caught by a platoon of soldiers. They fire, but the green-haired girl suddenly jumps in front, saving Lelouch's life. As the green lies on the ground, she suddenly starts talking about giving Lelouch “power.” Finding himself up against a wall, he accepts and is granted the power of Geass, where upon eye-to-eye contact, Lelouch can alter the will of anyone. He uses his power to escape the soldiers, by ordering them all to commit suicide, and begins to help the terrorists in their efforts against the Empire, later becoming their leader under the guise of Zero, a masked hero for justice. He begins to figure that, with his own cunning, his new power, and the terrorists' resources, he can finally topple Brittania and find out who killed his mother.
What happens from then on is a convoluted tale that warps between political intrigue, high school antics, supernatural powers, and personal anguish, as Lelouch and the others feel the weight of their new responsibilities and try to defeat their enemies and fears. The green-haired-girl, simply named as C2, returns as an immortal being capable of granting Geass power and willing to Lelouch with his rebellion as long as he fulfills his end of the contract, a detail that remains unrevealed for quite some time. Suzaku ends up climbing through the ranks of the Brittanian military, quickly ending up as a test subject for a special proto-type mech.
Oh, yeah. There's robots throughout the whole thing. All the battles are straight-up mecha army action.
Code Geass is a very ambitious story, trying to weave together so many plot threads and still make sense, and, to its credit, it mostly succeeds. While my head spun with each plot twist, each piece finds its resting place by the end of the long series and felt satisfied by the end. Things went well, even if I felt like everything was stumbling through mud from time to time.
The animation was incredible, not only with the vivid scenery and memorable character designs by CLAMP, but with the action and combat as well, a crucial element for mecha anime. The robots all seem to have wheels on their feet, so the battles feel like over-the-top roller derbies with guns, and somehow they made it work. The music was more of a downer. It had its moments, establishing easy-to-recognize themes when things worked or didn't work in the story, but it didn't stand out much and I felt more could have been done with it. Even the opening and ending themes were rather mediocre.
When I got a few episodes in, I gathered the sentiment that this was going to be Death Note but with mecha instead of mind games. Sunrise has had all sorts of experience with their Gundam franchise in combining a political drama with robots and so adding in this supernatural twist could make or break the series. While it stumbled around getting there, it did come together in the end, resulting in one of the most renowned series Sunrise has produced (I think it even won some awards in Japan a couple of times). In the end, my sentiment was right. Code Geass is Death Note with robots. You have webs of character relations, sudden plot twists, supernatural surprises (especially when Lelouch runs into other Geass users!), and a wealth of memorable moments that really makes this title stand out. I can now see what all of the hubbub was for and I don't regret it.
The Tower of Druaga: The Aegis Of Uruk (12 Episodes)
The Tower of Druaga: The Sword Of Uruk (12 Episodes)
Animation: ****
Story: ****
Music: ****
Overall: ****
The Tower of Druaga was an old Japanese arcade game where the heroes had to climb a 60 level tower in order to save the world. I don't think it ever made it to America, but it was quite a hit in Japan has since spawned a handful of games in the same world. In this anime series, Gonzo takes that game and turns it into a very entertaining romp through the tower and the personal struggles of those who climb it.
The story primarily revolves around Jil, a young Climber, who is sincere about getting to the top and defeating the great demon Druaga. However, the other Climbers don't want to listen because they're satisfied with how much money they can make Climbing the tower. He tries to join his older brother Neeba's group, only to be kicked out for his incompetence. He finally gets his own party, consisting of Ahmey, a female spear-wielder, Kaaya, a cheerful priestess, Melt, an eccentric mage, and Coopa, Melt's personal assistant that happens to have her own bag of tricks. They all decide to follow Jil up the tower in order to defeat the evil that lives at that top.
However, as they climb the tower, they begin to notice some of the connections between the tower and the condition of the king of the land, Gilgamesh, who supposedly defeated the tower the last time. Because it has come back and the past is slowly being revealed, the tower's true purpose becomes revealed and the heroes have to find the truth on top of it all.
While all of this is a very engaging Babylonian fantasy epic with it's own innovations (Melt's magic is swinging clubs like he's golfing, making Coopa a sort of caddy for him; it's brilliant), it is more than willing to take some time to put its tongue in its own cheek. The first episode is almost entirely a dream, spoofing itself and other action series and fantasy tropes (even going so far as a Monty Python reference and a sudden shift into Gurren Lagann mode) and not developing very much plot. Later on, the characters stumble into a series of bizarre traps that the heroes spend an entire episode walking into. They even take the time to send Jil into a life-size reenactment of the original video game, the other heroes controlling him with a joystick and buttons and having to restart every time something goes wrong. The moments of comedy brighten things significantly. Even if very little progression is made, it helps the viewers get to know the characters.
The second part of the series is much more serious, though, as things turn uglier, though it does take time to show the ski resort Melt builds within the tower. However, as it builds suspense and goes deeper into the secrets of the tower, I felt that the final showdown was rather light-weight compared to all the momentum it had been building. While I won't go into detail for the sake of those who haven't seen it, I thought there were some darker themes and heavier material into which they could have delved. Instead, they decide to pass over it and simply bring an end to everything.
The animation was great. Having many characters involved for massive battles with monsters and other Climbers went well for the most part. The biggest problem I had how the CG elements didn't blend into the 2D animation as well as it could have. It stood out and seemed somewhat distracting. Gonzo has always messed around with combining 2D with 3D, but they seemed to make it work so well ten years ago with Blue Submarine No. 6. It wasn't a major bother in Tower, but it was reoccuring. The music was nice, drawing on the themes from the video game but giving them a Lord of the Rings quality by giving them an orchestral feel. The opening and ending themes weren't bad either. Also, it should be noted that I watched this series subbed, for once. It'll be interesting how the series will sound after FUNimation dubs it.
The Tower of Druaga was a fun ride, even if it lost some steam at the end. And it's still available online (Thank you, CrunchyRoll!) so go watch it. It's worth it. It even led me to a discovery. I was in my local Hastings with some money to burn and I stumbled across the PS2 game The Nightmare of Druaga. Not only was it in the used bin for only four dollars, it was still shrink-wrapped after I tore off the used-wrap Hastings puts on its used materials. I primarily picked up simply because I was watching Druaga at the time. The game happens to be a wonderfully merciless dungeon hack that I imagine I'll be playing for years to come. I've become a fan of the Druaga series and look forward to where it'll pop up in the future.
Astro Boy (23 Volumes)
Rating: ***
Osamu Tezuka's genius has gone unrecognized lately, in my opinion. Especially in America. While I'm sure that most anime and manga fans are aware that he brought those two very mediums to the heights of popularity they enjoy now, they fail to realize that he himself is a great writer and artist, full of his own impressive ideas. Maybe some time I'll talk about his Phoenix series.
I recently finished Dark Horse's run of Tezuka's breakout hit, Astro Boy. He had some success with Kimba but Astro Boy is what got everyone's attention back then and the title propelled Tezuka to be the Godfather of Manga as he is known today. However, reading it now is a bit of a challenge. The layout and narrative style haven't aged well, coming across as very wordy and thick for a simple action series. Most of the time, Astro Boy is simply caught up in an evil plot or scheme and has to beat up the bad guys in order to save the day. General old-school superhero story-telling. This leaves the reader with a heavily episodic series that rarely refers to other stories. The particular collection that Dark Horse has translated doesn't even have the volumes in any kind of chronological or narrative order. You could pick up any volume and begin reading without having to read the others before it (except for two or three that collect a newspaper run, but even then, the story would be hard to follow).
So why do I give Astro Boy 3 stars? Well, even though Tezuka had to keep the story simple and action driven to please his editors, throughout his stories he was able to delve into more complicated material, even if it was merely subtext. The story begins with a brilliant robotics scientist named Dr. Tenma. However, he was so caught up with work that he neglected his own son. When his son got into a car accident, he felt the need to turn his life around, so he coerced the robotics department to help him create a robot version of his son and succeeded. Unfortunately, Dr. Tenma grew upset that the robot couldn't grow like a normal child and abandoned it, too, going into seclusion. Sometime later, Dr. Ochanamizu found the robot's body and rebuilt him with super powers, turning him into Astro Boy, who would eventually become the poster child for the ideology that robots deserve to have rights just like the humans.
I find it interesting that Tezuka is a contemporary of Isaac Asimov and his three rules of robotics. While they have their similarities, it's interesting to see how each of them consider the possibilities of robots with progressive artificial intelligence, and that's what makes Astro Boy such a remarkable work. The out-dated elements of the story can be compensated by the speculation and vision Tezuka offers for our future.
As for what to expect in future columns, I don't know what to tell you. I was expecting Shangri-La (which is has been pretty cool) to finish with 13 episodes but it's probably going to finish in the mid-twenties now. I do have Hyakko and Eden of the East fansubs sitting on my computer that I could finish up quite quickly. There are a couple of other anime series that I could really dive into that are just sitting around.
Another possibility may not be reviews of a specific title but a focus on broader topics within anime and manga. I'm not terribly industry savvy, but I could delve a bit into that as well. I'm just not sure. You'll just have to come back and check out what I've got to say!
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