It’s new anime season time, and what new season would be complete without random fans talking about their opinions? Well, possibly more enjoyable, but what the heck. Before I begin I should mention that all my knowledge about what’s new comes from whatever series have had their first episodes fansubbed in the last week or so (and are easy to download), so I’ll certainly miss a few and may even be including something that doesn’t belong. Oh well.
Let’s go (in more or less alphabetical order)!

AIR MASTER: This looks like one of those mostly mindless but still entertaining fighting shows (see also Flame of Recca and Get Backers), although the powers look to be less otherworldly and more Street Fighterish. It gets huge bonus points for having the main character be female (something I’ve wanted to see for a while) and huge minus points for including a shrill annoying craybaby (she breaks into tears when she loses at those UFO catcher games!). The fighting is good though (and even a bit Naruto-ish, with all those contortions and jumping), and if you’ll like this show that’s probably the only thing you really need to know.

DEMON DETECTIVE LOKI RAGNAROK: I thought this would be about a detective who was also a demon, but instead it’s about a detective who is also a little kid but who hunts demons. This show would be a lot better if the kid had any sort of powers or ghost-hunting ability other than blind luck and a CCS-style rod. It’s not really bad, but it’s not all that interesting either, although since it was only the first episode, maybe it’ll get better.

DNANGEL: For a mildly contrived girly thief show, this isn’t really that bad. Oh, let’s be honest: it’s weird and shoujo-y and I still like it. In fact, I could rattle off a whole list of its flaws and that doesn’t change the fact that I actually enjoy the thing. Well, I like the manga anyway, but by the second episode the TV show has either completely diverged from the manga or is mixing in bits and pieces from past volume three. Also, the show seems to have changed some of the rules about Daisuke’s shape changing. Oh well.

E’s OTHERWISE: Don’t you miss those days when the title of a show told you something about it? Or when the title even made ANY SENSE AT ALL? Anyway, this is about a bunch of psychic cops working for a benevolent corporation that controls a good chunk of the world and obviously has everyone’s best interests at heart. And if you believe that, I have the proverbial bridge to sell you. It looks like the main character will realize that he’s working for the bad guys before much longer though. As for quality, it’s fairly good, but the first two episodes seem to be little more than glorified background before the real meat of the story starts (main character versus evil corporation). I’ll have to see how it turns out.

LAST EXILE: A dark and gritty story about what looks like the civil war fought with airships. I liked it a lot, and although I have no idea where it’s going I’m pretty sure it’s going there in style. At first glance, I thought this was Bones’ new project. You know, the Cowboy Bebop and Wolf’s Rain Bones. Funny thing is, it’s really from GONZO. You know, the guys who usually make stuff like Gatekeepers or Real Bout High School (although to be fair, they’re also responsible for some things like Hellsing or Blue Sub 6). And Bones? Well, they’re responsible for…

SCRAPPED PRINCESS: The titicular princess is a fifteen year old girl who is a bit selfish and spoiled, but also kind and generally nice. Unfortunately, she it’s been fortold by a presumably accurate oracle that she will destroy the world when she turns sixteen. This, rather predicably, causes pretty much everyone around to try and kill her, from farmers to priests to old friends. She is being protected by her adoptive older brother (swordsman) and sister (mage), with the usual promise to kill her if she really is going to destroy the world. I really like the tone in this show, and it’s somewhat similar to Cowboy Bebop: when things are light it’s cheerful without turning into something like Slayers, and when things get serious it becomes darker but without turning into a full blown angstfest (coughcough X coughcough). It’s fair to say that I’m going to be following this one pretty closely.

NARUE NO SEKAI: Which translates as World of Narue. This is the weird insane one for this season. Narue is a strange girl who happens to be an alien. She makes no attempt to hide it: she even has a door plate that reads “Galactic Federation.” Of course, no one really believes her, except the male lead, who picks up a cute little puppy outside her appartment and then it turns into a SLAVERING EVIL SPACE MONSTER! He almost loses his head, but Narue comes up to bat for him (pun intended). This leaves the guy rather flumoxed, but by the end of the episode he and she are boyfriend and girlfriend. Well, after an encounter with a space ninjia (just like a normal ninja, but from space! Oh, and also incompitent and ugly). The biggest problem is that it tries to be as serious as it is funny, and ends up being not much of either. I’ll reserve judgement for an episode or two to see how it ends up though.

STELLVIA OF THE UNIVERSE: It’s time for kids in space! Specifically, ten year old girls in space (I’m estimating their age because, if it was ever given, I don’t remember). It’s light and generally okay, but it hasn’t really done anything that particularly impresses me either. A decent way to kill an hour or so if you can tolerate excessive sacharine, and it may even turn out to be something better a few more episodes down the line.

There you go, it’s done. Well, done to my satisfaction. I’ll post another update if something turns out far different from my expectations.

It has come to my attention that I have not been using this group blog for its intended purpose (talking about what anime I’m watching), but instead as a sort of digital soapbox to spew grand essays about anime fandom in general or (as was recently the case) some personal information without much relevance to anyone other than me. And this isn’t even taking into account my tendancy to spew out pages of dialogue sporadically instead of regular updates of a paragraph or two.

In short: sorry if you don’t like it, but I’m not likely to change.

Now that human stupidity day is nominally over, I figure it’s okay to come out a bit. Well, not really, I just want to talk for a bit. I tend to get extremely talkative after exercising my brain intensely for a few hours (although only about unimportant fun things like games and anime), such as during a prelim. Guess what I just did?

Anyway, now that my intro is over (my intro is bigger than most other people’s entire posts… *sob*), I’ll start the actual meat. First up is the dissapointing Weiss Kreuz Gluhen. I say “dissapointing” not because the first one was any good, but rather because it was most emphatically the opposite. In an era of serious, intensive Cowboy Bebops and Triguns, the first Weiss Kreuz was a seiryu vanity project that can best be described as Noir meets Power Rangers. It was every bit as laughably dumb as it sounds, and provided many hours of entertainment, albiet not the kind the creators were shooting for (if you’re into making fun of stupid people doing stupid things and sounding utterly pretentious (ie, an MST3K fan like me)). Gluhen, on the other hand, is just bland and unoriginal without being hillariously overwrought. You can see the change best in their jobs: in the original, their day job was running a flower shop. In Gluhen, they’re “ordinary” teachers and students. It’s a lot less funny, but not much better (thanks Lyn!).

Feeling good about yourself, the world, and our chances for survival? Glad I could help!

While I’m on the subject of things not related to anime, I’ll take a minute to plug Neal Stephenson’s (of “Snow Crash” fame (coincidentally, that book has the best main character name ever: Hiro Protagonist)) book “Cryptonomicon,” which gets serious bonus points for being clear and easy to understand despite telling a story nonlinearly in two separate time periods (WWII and about 1998) with a host of main characters and delving into mildly heady math (cryptoanalysis, or the study of codes; for those who don’t know, WWII was won entirely because the Allies were better at this than the Axis). I’d go into more depth about why it’s such a great book, but I should probably get back to anime before I’m lynched.

After a few months of waiting, the first Noir DVD arrived. This was an odd series for me, as it was one of the few shows I’ve watched that, after I finished it, I started liking less and less. It’s mired in slow pacing and constant flashbacks and lacking in thematic structure other than a sort of “life sucks, everyone dies” (wow, that sounded like I actually know what I’m talking about, huh? Go me the film critic!). The combat alternates between awsome (especially Kirika’s stunts) and abysmal (Kirika running up a wide, open with two guns, making no effort to even dodge, and effortlessly mowing down about thiry suits, and that’s not even talking about the random people equipped with knives and swords), and by the end it almost completely gives up on establishing character motivations (especially for Kirika and Althena (yes, everyone pronounces it Artena, but come on, you know what it’s supposed to be)). That said, it still has its moments (the tea fork scene in particular) and more than its fair share of really cool fights (in an interesting piece of polarity, they tended to be either really crappy or really cool, and there weren’t that many bad ones). And I suppose the ludicrously unsubtle lesbian undertones are worth a few points. Overall, it’s really a pretty decent show. It’s just a little sad that the best part of a show about two female assassins of ambiguous sexual orientation is the music.

Then again, it is REALLY GOOD music.

Or, happy april fools. I’m going to spend the day in blessed isolation from human contact (because a day dedicated to human stupidity and annoyingness is bound to bring out the best in people). See you tomorrow.

I have a fear of endings. When faced with the last episode of a show I really liked, I freeze up. I delay, I procrastinate, I find something else, and I put off the big finale because, once I watch it, it’s over. That’s it, no more, close the curtains and walk out of the theatre. The show that I put so much of my heart into is finished and there won’t be any more. It’s an illogical, visceral reaction that I just can’t help; on the one hand, I really want to watch those last episodes. I want to see how it ends, I want to see how everything’s sorted out, and I want to see the big climax. But the problem with a climax is that, by its very definition, it’s the last big bang before everything ends, and I don’t want it to end.

I think the first time I ever heard this feeling vocalized was during Nadesico. Akito, the main character, mentioned that he had never watched the last episode of his favorite anime because he didn’t want it to be over. At the time, I didn’t really understand what he was saying (Nadesico was one of the first few full season animes I had watched at the time), but now I do. It’s scary to have a show you really cared about, that you watched one episode at a time, speculating about future events in between showings, thinking about its good and bad points, and generally making it a part of your mind, stop.

Just at a glance, I have the unwatched endings to: Kiddy Grade, El Hazard, Gatekeepers 21, Kanon, Saikano, and Farscape, and that’s not even counting shows that I delayed finishing for weeks or months but ultimately completed. It’s not just serious character dramas that make me this hesitant either; the fact that El Hazard is the most delayed show on that list isn’t because I disliked the series (it’s more happenstance than anything else). The only real connection all those shows have is that they’re all building towards (or in the middle of) a really messy climax.

Someday, I’ll watch the last episode for all those shows. Someday, I’ll close the book on each of them. I doubt it will be that long from now.

But it ain’t gonna be today. I’ve got 19 episodes of Get Backers to catch up on, and when the last episode of that is released I can always add another series to my list.

I once said that the only thing I was sure about in Kiddy Grade is that the main characters are really cute, and that isn’t likely to change.

That was so close to a prophetically wrong statement that it’s really rather remarkable.

I was just idly fooling around online when I got a pop-up ad for Noir. Damn, do those ad companies know me or what?

I’m not scared about this at all. As it is, I’m only mildly gratified that Noir is being advertised a lot.

This lack of terror scares me immensely.

I hear they’re making a Saikano videogame. I think there are some very basic flaws with this idea. Like, what happens if you screw up, do you get a happy ending instead of a sad one?

Well, it’s been a while since my last post, and the board’s been a bit empty, so I’ll just chatter about whatever I feel like. Let’s see, let’s see…

I’m sure most people here have seen fanfics about certain animes trying to pair everyone up so they all come away happy, right? Often a sort of fan consensus emerges as to how it should be done. For instance, in Ranma, I believe the pairings go: Ranma-Akane, Mousse-Shampoo, Ukyou-Ryouga, Kuno-Nabiki, Tofu-Kasumi, Happousai-Cologne (you sick, sick people), and, on occasion, Sasuke-Kodachi (often with various drugs involved).

Just as a side note, I dare anybody to try this with Utena. You might get as far as Utena-Anthy and Touga-Saionji before everything goes to hell, and even T+S is stretching it a bit.

Anyway, there are some fun things to do with this. You and a friend can try to mess with each other’s minds by hooking people up in brain hurting ways (Of course, you have to justify your match at least vaugely, so no throwing together Mousse and Ryouga just because you feel like it. Ryouga-Ranma, maybe. I think the usual standard is “average dojinshi,” which isn’t terribly exacting), or you can try to pair up something that shouldn’t be and post it on a blog.

What the heck, I’m bored and I just finished reading my Megatokyo book. Let’s roll!

Piro-Kimiko HAS to happen, it’s the whole basis for the strip. Breaking them up would be like breaking up Van-Hitomi. As for the others, Erika-Largo has a certain appealing symetry to it, since it puts together the two main male characters with the two main females. Now, moving down the ladder of importance, Seraphim… and Boo! Eww, no, I’m just joking. Seraphim’s probably way too busy for a boyfriend anyway (and considering that the only one of appropriate size is Asmodeus… actually, what the hell, toss them together, it kinda works in an angel+devil way), and Boo is, as we all know, the only giant miniature space hamster in the realms, so he’s a bit screwed. Well, actually the problem is that he’s not screwed, but whatever.

As for Miho, the perfect partner is obvious: Ping! The cynical possible source-of-all-evil is already warming up to Ping as a person, and it’s only a matter of time before she decides to play with Ping’s more advanced… programming. After all, it’s what she was made for, right? And all Ping really wants is someone to play with her. Besides, if they get together you have underage Japanese schoolgirl/cute robot lesbian angst. You can’t get more creepy fanboy fetishes than that without tossing in cat ears and a tail, and somehow I bet you can buy Ping those as accessories.

Ed and Dom get each other, of course. In a strictly plutonic, antagonistic relationship, of course. **whistles innocently**

Oh wait, I forgot about the three schoolgirls with the bag and drawing lessons. Um… let’s just ignore them okay? They’re just minor characters and there aren’t any more guys to go around. If you really must, call them a lesbian threesome, but not around Piro and don’t tell ANYONE you got the idea from me. I mean that.

There are some good shows that run for 13-26 episodes and maybe a movie, and then they’re done, no matter how successful or good they were (Evangelion, Escaflowne). There are other shows (like Gundam) that blossom into extended chronologies, launching spinoffs that, even if sometimes are rather subpar (coughWingcough), generally retain some quality. Then there are other shows that spawn successive generations, only like a genetic experiment gone terribly wrong each generation is weaker and suckier than the ones that came before, leading into a terrible downard spiral (witness two of Pioneer’s cash-cows, Tenchi and El-Hazard).

So imagine my surprise when I found the new Tenchi show to be actually GOOD. And, as far as I can see, the oceans have yet to turn to blood. Freaky.

Well, I say “the” new Tenchi, although there’s also a continuation of the original OVA I haven’t seen (and don’t think it’s being fansubbed, or if it is, a casual search didn’t turn up the right files). The one I’ve seen is Tenchi GXP, or Galaxy Police. No, I don’t know what the X in the middle stands for, but I’m pretty sure it’s not “X-treme,” so that’s some tension let out right there.

Now, the basic plot summary: the unluckiest boy in the world, Seina, gets… wait, first I should define “unluckiest” better. Trouble doesn’t just go looking for him, it has his location marked with a big X (possibly the one from the title) and is sending bomber runs and is already planning the infantry invasion. If bad luck was money, he wouldn’t just have enough to buy the whole galaxy, he’d have enough to start taking over the ones next door. People who know him well don’t bother to plan for the worst, because they know he’ll manage to top whatever they can possibly imagine. For Seina, Merely biking a mile or two to his best friend’s house is long enough for several painful encounters, including trucks, a broken bicycle, a really painful ride down a forested hill, and a spaceship landing in the pond next to his sempai’s house, Tenchi Masaki.

Which is about where his luck gets… if not better, at least different. Seina is given a way to enroll to become a Galaxy Police officer by a policewoman with an operative style reminicent of Mihoshi (although not quite THAT stupid, she just talks a lot and jumps to conclusions and has a hard time listening. She’s not a complete moron, just halfway there). Suddenly, the whole universe opens up for our hero, as he gets the opportunity to break down supposedly failsafe systems across the galaxy merely by attempting to use them.

So, Seina gets to head into space to assemble his very own harem, although it seems like they’re mostly hanging out with him out of pity at times. Despite that, the show manages to do a lot of things pretty well. First off, it ditches all the original Tenchi characters except for a brief cameo mention here or there (my favorite so far is “Washu’s Tiny Hole”). It’s about time, really, since as much as I love the crew, they’re a bit stale at this point (65 episodes and three movies do that to you, especially when so many episodes are of rather questionable quality). Another good thing is that there’s an actual plot progression, although it’s not terribly fast, at least it isn’t just a whole bunch of episodes with them trapped in a small house. Beyond that, probably the best part of the show is that, despite the physical-comedy nature of a lot of the jokes (revolving around Seina’s eternal bad luck and various things hurting him), hillarity still somehow manages to ensue. I blame the director, Nabeshin of Excel Saga fame (for the 1% of you not onto the joke yet, his real name is WataNABE SHINichi. I think you can figure out the rest on your own).

So, in short: if you liked the hyper-crack stylings of Excel Saga (and that would probably be most of you), this is like a slightly less hyper version of that set in a surprisingly faithful interpretation of the Tenchi universe (actually, it has a firmer grasp than many previous Tenchi products have had). It’s not going to make you ponder great questions of human morality, but it will probably make you laugh. At the very least, it can set up countless nerdy debates about which girl is the best. (My favorite so far is Mitoto. Not as a girlfriend (oh god no), I just think she’s the coolest character.)

I’ve noticed that I tend to go for long periods of time with no posts, then come back with a several page essay. Quality over quantity, that’s my motto! Anyway, next time maybe I’ll talk about some of the news shows they’re starting. Of course, to do that I’ll need to download a few more of them, but hey, that’s what an otaku’s life is all about.

And once again, I’m back. This time I had some nasty computer trouble, including a reformatted hard drive and internet problems and such. Thankfully, I didn’t really lose anything this time. Word of advice people: when tech support asks you to delete key system files, remember that they just might not know what the hell they’re doing.

Also, I’m not going to whine about my wisdom teeth coming out. Sure, my mouth hurts and I can’t really talk or eat anything but soup, but no complaining here! Nope, not a word. I’ll just let out some bile about a series that I wasn’t thrilled with.

I’ve used my vacation well, and finally finished Ai Yori Aoshi. Despite having the whole series for a long time, it’s taken a while because, for me at least, this series was really a rollercoaster ride. First it would be great… then I couldn’t stand it… then it was okay… then it was mediocre… then it looked like it was getting better… then it fell into the gutter again… and so on and so on. Mostly it bounced back and forth between being a cool show and being a cynical cash-in on fanboys desperate to pretend they’re loved by a horde of pretty girls (ie, everything that makes a harem show bad).

On the one hand, it had some really good elements. The thing with Kaoru running away from his tyrannical zaibatsu family was cool, and I wish they’d developed it instead of just tossing it out there and mostly ignoring it. Tina had moments where she was an interesting character, and watching Miyabi’s ice gradually crack was always a bit entertaining. Except…

Half the characters had no real development aside from having a badly explained crush on Kaoru. Sasami with a dye job and tan (oh, sorry, I mean Chika) seemed to only be included in order to attract scary pedophile fanboys, and the clumsy girl who desperately wants to be a maid (why would anyone want to be that) does the same for anyone with the maid-fetish that seems to be currently sweeping Japan. And Tina has to go around grabbing other girls breasts WHY exactly? (that was a rhetorical question) Plus, the show steals charaters and plots shamelessly from other well-known shows. One of the most prominent is the photo club Kaoru is involved in, which was ripped off Ah! My Goddess’s motorbike club so completely they didn’t even bother to change one of the sempai’s character designs.

And that’s not even counting the whole “women should be happy to stay home and clean and cook and wear kimonos” theme that runs rampant in the show. I mean, I’m not exactly a rabid feminist, but half the time Aoi opened her mouth I had a burning desire to shake her and scream “Show some backbone! Wear some pants! Hire someone else to cook and clean! Go somewhere and have fun! Do, I dunno, whatever women do to get liberated.” Although she admittedly gets a little better by the last few episodes, going so far as to dare to speak when not spoken to (I’m exagerating, but not by much).

At least it ended on a pretty high note. Kaoru got something that almost resembled character development and Aoi managed to stand up to her parents. Of course, the rest of his harem stayed exactly as they were, forever pining after the Karou so fanboys can mentally take his place and make out with whichever girl they like most (personally, I like Tina. Sure, she’s a mildly violent lush and is used mostly for fanservice, but she’s the only girl there who shows a backbone and is over 16).

Next time, I promise to rant about a show I actually like. Interestingly enough, before I watched this I thought I’d like it but it turned out I only tolerated it. The next rant will be about a show I thought would turn out mediocre and I ended up loving it.