Animation Revelation's Animation Blog

This brings the first appearance of Aquaman in the series. Although he appeared in an episode of Superman: TAS prior to JL, both versions seem to contrast from each other. The S:TAS version had Aquaman resemble his classic self, while the one in “The Enemy Below” has his “badass” look- long hair, shaggy beard, and no shirt, as well as the attitude.

This doesn’t make Aquaman all too likable- he comes off rude, impulsive, and a bit of an ass. And to paraphrase Glen Quagmire, he might have got away with all of this if he wasn’t such a bore. There isn’t really anything to save him in either episodes. There’s an attempt to humanize Aquaman by adding a scene or two in about his son, but even those feel artificial.

The basic story is that Aquaman is attempting to protect Atlantis from oncoming nuclear attacks and comes up on land to defend his case. Meanwhile, his brother, Lord Orm, takes over Atlantis, and sends Deadshot out to kill him. I can’t help but feel like that at least a few different Namor subplots have been ripped off here, and I’m not even a big Sub-Mariner fan, either.

Timm and co are still working on the show’s kinks, and it shows. The Leaguers get little character time, and Aquaman doesn’t have much to work with, either. His brotherly feud with Orm isn’t any special after seeing how well the Thor movie handled his and Loki’s. The scene with Aquaman losing his hand is effective and brings another part of the character in place, but even the peril feels off. The action also feels trite, when present. Almost like lasers shooting off at nothing on sea, and like GI Joes hand-to-hand.

Slightly better than the previous episodes, but it still makes for a wholly average episode. It’ll take a top-notch story editor to take things around.

That said, you want to know what the best part of both eps was? “Let me give you one word of advice.” Kevin Conroy has not skipped a beat yet.

Originally posted on Thursday, December 1, 2011.

For this episode, we get a look at the Green Lantern John Stewart. Back when this show was in its production stages, there was controversy over choosing John as a main character for the show, the two main reasons being that it felt like token casting for some people, as well as the fact that there has already been a Green Lantern in the DCAU, namely Kyle Rayner. So of course, the writers had to quickly prove that he could be an interesting character in his own right. Where Rayner was young, imaginative, and unused to the idea of being among the likes of Superman or Wonder Woman, Stewart shows a more militant approach to things. He doesn’t view being a superhero as something fantastic or amazing, but as a civil duty. This alone helps prove to be an interesting contrast to the worlds he travels as well as creates a certain odd couple relationship that he has with Flash. We also get a few hints in this episode that Stewart’s duty as a Lantern is slowly consuming his life, as we see him in his hometown only reluctantly interacting with the people he grew up with. While we already see this within Batman, it proves to be more interesting seeing this happen for a regular man like John rather than a multi-billionaire.

Unfortunately, this character development gets delivered to us via a poorly maneuvered plot. In it, John is arrested by Manhunters for the accidental destruction of an alien planet that he was accused of by a wanton criminal. Because of this, the court, the jury, the Guardians, and even his fellow Lanterns treat him as a pariah without so much as checking the evidence of whether or not he really did it. I know I’m probably nitpicking, but this element alone undermined whatever quality this story had. The entire plot of these episodes weighs upon the inability for alien law enforcement to even so much as check the “debris” of the planet. Instead, they blindly rely on the word of a common criminal over a Green Lantern acting in self-defense. Even though interactions with some of the aliens imply a less than cordial view of the Corps, it still feels like several characters in the story were being idiots for the sake of the plot.

The villains of the story, the Manhunters, prove to be marginally more interesting than the White Martians, mostly because the twist that they were the predecessors to the Green Lanterns adds an undertone to what the Corps could be like if headed by less altruistic members (which easily could have been shown with Sinestro, but the writers rarely seemed to remember him). However, the plot’s pretty inconsistent as to how strong these guys are. At the beginning, only a handful of them were able to fight the Justice League to a standstill. While by the end, entire legions of Manhunters end up dropping like flies by the hands of the Guardians, several Green Lanterns, and even the same JL members that previously struggled against them. Albeit, this is far from a unique flaw in action shows, but you’d think something like Justice League would be smart enough not to play this trope so dreadfully straight.

So overall, nil for two. While In Blackest Night improves upon the character study that Secret Origins lacked, it has plot holes the size of ostrich eggs.

But on the bright side of things, it does have an amusing scene of Flash trying (and failing) to be Johnny Cochran. If seeing Wally play lawyer doesn’t make you laugh, nothing will.

Originally posted on Thursday, November 24, 2011.

During Earth’s first contact with Mars, astronauts accidentally awaken the White Martians, who slowly breach the defenses of humanity and prepare for their invasion. When this conquest begins, Batman and Superman prove unable to save the world alone and must look for outside help. So with that, Flash, Green Lantern, Wonder Woman, Hawkgirl, and the last original Martian J’onn J’onzz join alongside them to form the Justice League and help Earth face off against oblivion.

When watching previous crossovers such as World’s Finest or The Demon Reborn, one couldn’t help but feel something epic from how Batman and Superman met. It was like the equivalent of seeing Pink Floyd and Iron Maiden join together. It made their universe feel larger, added a level of vibrancy in seeing Lois Lane interact with Batman or Harley fight Mercy Graves, and created the general feeling that shit was going to go down. So when I first saw the commercials for Justice League as a kid, it felt like seeing the pearly gates open while endless swarms of seraphim angels greeted you as if you were a saint.

But now as an adult and looking back at the premiere, with crossovers between DC superheroes about as common as beggars in the alley, it just feels kind of stilted. Admittedly, it holds up a hell of a lot better in comparison to other shows I watched as a kid, but that’s pretty much expected when it comes to DCAU shows. In comparison to the premieres of series from that universe like On Leather Wings, Rebirth, or the Last Son of Krypton, Secret Origins just feels lacking. Maybe it was because the staff wasn’t used to working with so many characters all at once, or that they were too tired from having just finished STAS and wrapping up Batman Beyond. Whatever it was, these three episodes are far from Justice League’s best.

First off, let’s get to how the characters are brought in. The show expects you to have at least known about BTAS and STAS beforehand, so Batman and Superman are introduced with about as much fanfare as any other character. Wonder Woman’s beginning has a bit more set-up by showing Themyscira and her reason for wanting to take up the mantle, and the premiere already does a good and subtle job establishing her character as brash and alien to human culture. The plot also does well in
presenting J’onn in where he came from and what his wants and needs are. However, Flash, Green Lantern, and Hawkgirl just seem like they’re there purely for the sake of it. There’s very little buildup to their appearances, so it just feels random to see them. And though Flash quickly gets revealed to be the comic relief of the team, there’s very little room left to show John and Shayera’s personalities, let alone plant the seeds of their relationship throughout the series. While later episodes will do well in solidifying the cast, the debut of the Justice League feels quite jumbled and unable to properly define each member.

For the villains of this story, the White Martians, it just seems like a bit of a stretch for them to invade Earth so easily. You would think that with previous alien threats like Darkseid or Brainiac, everyone would be better prepared against such a widespread assault. Though the plot tries to explain this weakness with earlier scenes showing the dismantling of nuclear weapons, it just feels too convenient for the plot to portray the military in an almost completely useless matter. And while the use of sunlight as a weakness against them serves as a decent, if not also convenient, way to resolve the story, it also raises questions, such as how no one noticed that a figure as public as a US senator never went outside during the day. I’m far from one to determine what’s odd or not for politicians, but never going into sunlight at all should rise up several red flags at the least.

As for the premise of the episodes, it’s a generic invasion story and nothing more. There are a few twists, like the aforementioned senator being one of the aliens, but none of them are of any particular note as to shock the audience in any way. In short, with too much time taken away to introduce everybody as well as showcase some fight scenes, the main plot has nowhere to grow.

Overall, it definitely feels like the production staff is far from finding their footing. While it does well in spectacle, it lacks when it comes to pulling off a plot for an ensemble cast. Still, a bad first few episodes doesn’t determine the quality of an entire show, and Justice League is a reminder of that.

Originally posted on Thursday, November 17, 2011.

Hey, long time no trial.

At nighttime, Tomoya, Nagisa, and Fuko decide to do what any sane teenager would do, i.e. break into school. Tomoya plays the straight man and questions this idea, but Nagisa trusts this path given how her father still remembers Fuko after hearing her name. Since really, how hard can it be to forget this annoying green-haired midget? I know I unfortunately haven’t.

After a few minutes of sitting around while the opening plays, Fuko tears apart the wrappings of her gifts. When Tomoya scolds her for not being patient, she replies, “Even if my head knows it, I can’t control what my hands do.” What a surprise.

She looks at her presents, which just consist of a party hat, some candles, a microphone…. What the hell kind of presents are these?

Fuko orgasms yet again, giving Tomoya the opportunity to steal her hat. She goes into manchild rage and starts attacking Tomoya until she gets back her swag. They both fall onto the floor, leading to Fuko sitting on Tomoya’s lap like a hooker on Christmas.

Tomoya calls Fuko a fatass, then she randomly points out how neither of the two leads call each other by their first names. Wait, she’s making sense for once? Tomoya becomes stupid and says, “That is not a very logical argument.” But since she has it her way, Fuko just forces them to use honorifics and the like. So Tomoya ends up stuttering when trying to say “Nagisa-chan.”

“That just proves that the two of you are more childish than me.” Well said, midget ghost girl.

Tomoya then decides to drop the honorifics like any decent dub should do, and realizes how natural it sounds. Well, duh!

Fuko yet again becomes the sane man in the show by talking about how Tomoya and Nagisa are exactly like Future Tomoya and her sister. She then kisses both of them, which Nagisa replies by wrapping a party hat on her. Having ascended into Teletubby status, Fuko becomes giddy as bloody Blondie and wants to start a party with these… people.

Ignoring the dangers of letting Fuko near fire, they throw a celebration for the sister and her wedding that no one will go to because of Melodrama Ex Machina. They just sit around together for the next few minutes while staring at candles. Realizing that the plot makes no sense, the three all go to sleep. And by the morning, Fuko finally disappears; with the remaining two wondering what the hell they did last night.

Nagisa’s dad assumes that it’s what all of you presume and decides to bring Mr. Bat along to swing at Tomoya before being forced to just attack the air. The Furukawas don’t remember, since apparently even Fuko’s name causes people to forget. Soon after, Tomoya and Nagisa both wonder about the exact purpose of the starfish carvings that they somehow got, yet feel relaxed at the mere look at it, as if it’s their stash.

Kyou wanders in, wondering why the hell Tomoya’s been standing around doing nothing like he’s been acting every other episode. She asks him to shop with her and the doormat, but Kyou gets rejected because Tomoya’s too stupid to write down stuff about Fuko in case he’d forget it.

He sits beside Nagisa and keeps on angsting about what he needs to remember. They both walk by Hitler, who’s writing up a giant sign for the wedding. Wait, the Fuhrer can remember being told about the wedding, but Nagisa and Tomoya can’t? Why? I mean, Ms. Ibuki told them about the wedding. It’s not like she has memory denying powers or whatever the hell this show’s trying to do.

After being reminded of Ms. Ibuki, they finally remember Fuko, which causes her to automatically spawn between them. Tomoya whines about how they could have forgotten such an important commemoration, and then they hug, being so sappy that the Tanners could vomit from watching this.

The next day, they find a bunch of people at the school for the wedding, except the students since they can’t be convinced to give a damn about their teacher unless they get a starfish thrown at them. The show cuts to Future Tomoya putting the wedding ring on Ms. Ibuki. After which, the trio find a hoard of students out and about at the school. Kyou and Ryou appear, just having found their starfish at the exact bloody day of the wedding and being reminded of the wedding unlike Tomoya and Nagisa. Sunohara pops up in a bowtie, because bowties are lame. We then get a brief montage of everybody from Droopy to Glasses Girl appearing at the marriage, even those guys that beat up Sunohara in the first episode.

As the couple march out, Fuko remembers that dream of hers about starfish and shirtless Tomoya, and decides that she’s finally at peace, leading her to finally fucking disappear. Ms. Ibuki notices our humble protagonist crying, hearing him going on about how much he loved her despite how we saw nothing but them acting like bastards to each other. I’ve seen more cordial conversations between Christian fundamentalists and gay pride participants in comparison to how Tomoya and Fuko acted to each other. You’re really going to tell me these two had some special, inseparable bond? Really?

Being Clannad, Fuko appears again to give her sister a starfish only to fade away. Nobody seems to freak out over how a ghost randomly appeared out of nowhere, let alone turned into confetti. After the nuptials, Ms. Ibuki gives a speech about how Fuko can be happy as long as everyone else is happy (and buy Clannad merchandise. One can only be happy if they buy Clannad merchandise. You wouldn’t want Fuko to be unhappy, would you?).

The day after, they forget about Fuko again, yet have really vague memories of her interspersed with the girl going off into the light like in Poltergeist. Tomoya then proceeds to give a monologue as if anything of what we saw means something.
Well, at least Fuko’s gone and will never come back again… Right? Right?

Okay, we finally close off the first arc. Laughs were had, deeds were done, and I became diagnosed for severe clinical depression. As a consolation, the next arc can’t be that bad in comparison—

“Will she bully me?”
“Yes! If you would like me too.”

Fuck… o.

Originally posted on Thursday, October 27, 2011.

So, right off the bat you must be wondering what the hell I’m doing writing-up about a single episode of an EXTREMELY long-running established series such as this (as opposed to reviewing some DVD set for it or something of the sort). Well, to be frank, this series’ length is actually a big part of the importance of this entry, and why I’m even writing about it in the first place. For those unfamiliar with Eichiro Oda’s insanely popular long-running series One Piece, let me just briefly clue you in on what exactly this particular episode is: Its basically the tried and true inescapable concept that is found in almost all long-running shonen series, simply known by many as the “time-skip.” Even for a series with as many unique quirks as One Piece, this sort of plot-device was inevitable (though, to the series’ credit, it was extremely well handled in this case). Normally that wouldn’t qualify it for an entry on the list, but for this to happen so late in the run of such a long series, and due the huge plot-points that build up to this, its almost like an event among fans of the series, so let’s just say that this entry is an exception.

Now, I should mention that Toei animation isn’t exactly known for their quality. In fact they are known for quite the opposite, usually cutting as many corners as possible and producing cheap productions values where they can to cut costs, but even they decided to put some effort into the premiere of One Piece’s so called “New World” arc.

The episode opens with a brief little prologue building up to Monkey D. Luffy’s grand return on the television screen since….like, a week ago (but this is after a 2 year in-series time-skip so it still carries an epic feeling to it….sort of). I must say that I quite enjoyed how even such a little thing as showing the face of the main character who every fan of the series already knows so well is built up to like its a big deal, as it honestly does effectively build an effectively impressive atmosphere around him. In fact, this whole premiere is basically a series of character re-introductions, and in the case of newcomers to the series who decided to jump in here, they can be considered first time introductions. This may sound completely pointless and sound like it makes for a boring slow-paced episode, but if you know anything about shonen and the concept of their larger than life characters (well, only so few shonen can be bold enough to claim that their characters achieve such status), then this actually makes for a pretty grand opening, and in many ways it reminded me of other classic anime that used such techniques, such as Lupin III in the first episode of the Red Jacket series.

Well, to be fair there is a fair amount of plot happening in the background. The series’ narrator goes into brief detail recapping the events leading up to this episode, which should no doubt be helpful to any newcomers to the series. After the short prologue piece the anime starts off with a brand new opening song sung by the Golden Team who in fact sung the original opening for One Piece which is now all but iconic in Japan, even among people who aren’t fans of One Piece. The episode continues on Saboady Archipelago which fans will know as the site in which the Straw Hat pirates agreed to reunite at. Over there people are buzzing about the return of the Straw Hat pirates after having been missing for years, except (as we the viewers find out) it just so happens that a group of imposters claiming the famous name of the Straw Hat pirates have been using their infamous status to higher the toughest pirates in the area to work under them in their conquest to the new world. This may sound completely ridiculous, and it is, but so is a Skeleton that plays rock music and sings “Bone to be Wild,” an overly-cheery talking Reindeer, and a sun-glass wearing Cyborg among other things. If all of this sounds completely ludicrous to you, you clearly must be unaware of the strange, strange world of One Piece, in which crazy stuff like this is the norm. However aside from just comedic effect, the episode manages to hit some serious notes the imposters show their cruelty by mercilessly killing other pirates and innocent bistandards.

In the middle of this all, the real Straw Hat pirates start appearing on the island one-by-one as they begin making their way to their destined meeting place. This of course effectively sets up the scenario of some inevitable ass-kicking that you know will be coming as the series proceeds from this point.

One Piece is a series that has had a long and healthy run with maybe some hitches along the way. Nevertheless, the fact that it can still to this day capture such a grand feeling of excitement is a testament to its quality as a series. The main question is whether or not this is a good starting point for anyone who has watched little to none of the series beforehand and does not feel like doing so. Admittedly while One Piece as a series is a slow-starter, most of the fun of premieres such as this comes with the rewarding feeling of having followed the characters of this long-running story right from the beginning. Originally they were all no-name pirates who had to struggle their way through much weaker seas. Seeing the series opening with all of them having achieved world-famous status elicits a sense of accomplishment to the viewers who had spent so much time just watching them do it. I doubt that a newcomer would enjoy this premiere nearly as much as a fan. That said, if one were to jump on the One Piece bandwagon from this point in the series, I can say that there are worse places to start, and for all intensive purposes the minimal references to past events so far would ensure that you could generally follow the story elements present at least from this point. That said, I would only recommend it to newcomers if they absolutely refuse to invest too much time in the series by starting from the very beginning.

Overall though, for what its worth, this is a great premiere for what’s supposed to be the 2nd half of the series (assuming that its even half-way done to begin with), and a fantastic way to start off an entire brand new era to such a renowned, long-running series of this nature.

Originally posted on Sunday, October 16, 2011.

Working’!!

The crew of Wagnaria are back, with pedophilic-to-the-bone Takanashi, misandrist bitch Inami, frothing-bucket-of-abhorrent-midget-jokes Poplar, and some other bastards that I couldn’t give less of a fuck enough to even name them. The plot for this season is… uh; they just hang around and do anything that would get an actual restaurant quarantined or slapped with a cornucopia of lawsuits. The only things that happen involve Takanashi getting pissed over a roach dying, and Poplar trying to grow a pair (of inches).

So yeah, you like unfunny gag shows with utterly no development or depth in the characters other than one joke repeated over and over? Then fuck you for making this series popular enough to have a second season. At least with shit like K-On!, they actually care enough to get some proper production values. Whereas for Working’!! (And the fuck kind of title is that?), even looking at a frame of this makes me groan. Not a single second of this show made me smile in the slightest. Even by slice-of-life standards, this anime is fucking awful. You’re better off watching middle-aged amputee gay scat porn than this.

But on the bright side, it doesn’t have that “Some WAN WAN!” opening.

1/10 – Dr. Insomniac

Bakuman 2

So here we are with season 2 of this writer’s favorite currently running manga, Bakuman. The story of Ashirogi Muto’s (pen name of artist Mashiro and writer Tagaki) quest to become the ultimate manga-ka and the king of the manga world. Now despite my praise for the manga, I wasn’t too thrilled on season 1. It was overly slow, had uneven pacing, filler that wasn’t necessary, and too much of a focus on one of the manga’s subplots in a way that almost shifted the tone of the story. The horrendous opening theme of the season didn’t do it any favors either. They basically turned a fast paced shonen about following your dreams into a slow paced shojo at times. The season was good, but not particularly great.

Here we are with season 2 of the manga starting on the Trap arc, and almost instantly you can see improvements. The direction is always moving, the dialogue doesn’t have as many awkward breaks, and the pacing finally manages to match up to the manga. What’s more is the little filler used here is used to enhance the story and not to add padding to needless aspects. Even the voice actors seem more inspired and into it, and they were easily the highlight of the first season. Suffice to say, the premiere of season 2 is a marked improvement from season 1’s affair and I for one am hoping the rest of the season matches up.

In this episode we meet new characters, learn new information about the world of manga, and Ashirogi Muto gets a new editor. If this sounds boring to you, then you definitely aren’t acquainted with how Bakuman works. Ignore season 1 and jump in here, or better yet read the manga and catch up on the adaption starting with this.

9/10 – Desensitized

Hunter X Hunter (2011):

So, anyone who knows me knows that I’m a huge fan of Togashi’s manga, from Yu Yu Hakusho and Level E to Hunter X Hunter. I especially love how good the adaptations of his anime have been, including the original HXH anime that started airing back in 1999. So, naturally when I heard that Mad House was doing a full on reboot starting from scratch, I had my doubts as to whether they could live up to the original anime adaptations, especially given their more inconsistent track record with their recent output over the last few years. After having seen their premiere episode of HXH….well, its only 1 episode so no, its not like it changed my mind, but I will say that it has given me some more hope that they know what they are doing with this renowned shonen title.

The general premise is about a boy named Gon Freecs who wants to follow in his in his father, world famous Hunter Ging Freecs’s footsteps and become a licensed Hunter himself. A Hunter is a sort of licensed expert who is highly skilled in combat and various Hunter specialize in different fields from treasure hunting or discovering new species of exotic creatures to Blacklist Hunters who serve as bounty hunters of sorts. The plot itself has a very generic set-up on the outset, but anyone who is familiar with Togashi’s unique and unconventional writing methods would know that his series are anything but generic. Togashi takes enough to tried and true shonen archetypes to set up a basic story, but everything else is his own spin on the genre and he isn’t shy from taking this story through some downright dark turns that can quite frankly border on madness for what’s supposed to be a children’s story in Japan.

Of course, things in the series do start out on a light note and at least in this tone Mad House succeeds at capturing the feeling of wonder, mystery, and the sense of adventure that Togashi’s story has about it. They also have one HUGE major advantage that almost no other shonen anime has the luxury of these days, and that’s a HUGE wealth of source material. The manga for Hunter X Hunter is essentially over 300 chapters long at this point, and while its still going, Mad House starting from scratch gives them plenty of material to work with without having to resort to extended bouts of filler, and this premiere shows that they won’t use any filler material unless its absolutely necessary. Essentially doing in 1 episode what took the original anime 3 episodes to cover, Hunter X Hunter (2011) manages to start things off at a quick and even pace. You get to see just enough of Gon’s home village and get a sense of the world he grew up in before he departs into a much grander world outside of Whale Island, which is completely foreign to both him and the viewer. When you throw in some considerably high production values (relative to other series in this genre) and a pretty great soundtrack that may arguably be on par with the original anime, you get what could be the perfect set-up for another hit run for an already proven hit series. The question still lingers as to whether Mad House can deliver on Hunter X Hunter’s endless potential, but if the first episode is any indication, they’ve certainly gotten off to a decent start. – Ensatsu-ken

Another day, another remake. Yes, you’re reading this right, this is a remake of an anime from 1998 adapted from a manga by the creator of shonen classic Yu Yu Hakusho. But I won’t be comparing the two here for a multitude of reasons, merely to tell you that this new adaption of Hunter X Hunter has so far started on the right foot. If you would like to get into this long running (and still running in Shonen Jump) series, this is probably the best shot you have and that isn’t exactly a bad thing.

Everyone is aware that the one issue leveled at Hunter X Hunter is that it has pacing problems, especially in the early story. Right off the bat, this first episode condenses the first three episodes of the first anime into one package making the plot a lot easier to dive into for those who might not have the patience. Of course, there are aspects of the story left out (possibly for flashback material later), but unless you’re a super fan, you probably won’t notice there is anything missing and that might be for the best as the material, while important, works against the series in pacing at this early stage of the story.

As a fan, I could be a bit more critical, but I also realize that this is being made especially for those of us who have not experienced the story of Hunter X Hunter yet, and on that level it’s a rousing success. If you have yet to dive into this epic shonen, now is most definitely the time to do so.

8/10 – Desensitized

C³

The first words in the show are “The smell of the soil, the smell of the iron, it smells like iron.” Just pointing that out there.

So random, boring kid gets a suspicious looking box that he can’t open. The box turns out to be a naked, albino girl who eats crackers in a cutesy manner likely to become jack-off material for paedophiles. Naked, albino girl then turns out to be an abusive bitch that has to be taught how to drink tea. While random, boring kid and his best friend/hypotenuse go to school, naked, albino girl puts on clothes (yet shows enough skin to make Mary Whitehouse’s head explode) and decides to go out on town. She then comes back and fails to clean up the house, just so the viewers can get some schadenfreude out of the annoying “Ha-hah, silly girl can’t do anything useful for her future boyfriend!” moments. Random, boring kid comes back and seethes with generic rage at how his house is a mess, yet he decides to have a bland tender moment with albino girl by the end of the episode.

Stock archetypes that were shoved in my eyes via a dozen other shows, a bland plot that has as much movement as a quadriplegic horse, and crappy animation which DEEN could probably outdo all makes for a rather dreadful experience. If it counts, the soundtrack was all right to listen to. But that would be like saying, “Oh, Alone In The Dark was a shit movie, but I liked to listen to the songs in it.”

I should also probably be concerned about the constant ass shots of a girl that looks like her age is on the clock, but at this point, it’s par for the course.

1/10 – Dr. Insomniac

Phi Brain – Kami no Puzzle

You know, I would probably like this show if the puzzles weren’t just simple Sudoku or maze games. The characters act as if finishing a crossword is some task that only Einstein can accomplish. A good show that involves these elements would have the viewers immerse themselves into seeing what’s the solution and how it can be resolved. But in here, the answers are told instead of shown, with the show essentially just trying to shove it in our faces how smart the main character is for finishing little sliding games instead of trying to get the audience to use their own mind to spot the clues. Really, the viewing experience was kind of like a bland Let’s Play.

And didn’t like how the puzzle at the climax was solved through a plot device instead of actual sleuthing.

That said, it definitely has tighter plotting in comparison to other stuff this season, and it doesn’t render you bored. And I enjoyed the soundtrack, which has a nice mix of salsa and some drums. Still, if you want puzzles, it’d probably be worth more of your time to play some Professor Layton instead of watching this.

5/10 – Dr. Insomniac

Kimi to Boku

You ever wondered what Ouran would be like without Haruhi? Well, here you go. I’m not even exaggerating, the cast has the tagalong kid, the logical guy with glasses, the twins, and all that’s missing is a Tamaki or a Mori to go along for the ride. What sucks even more is that it didn’t bother to rip off what made Ouran interesting or funny, it just took the characters and turned them into milquetoast. It also took out the ludicrousness, personality, plot, and art.
The character designer made the cast as bored and uncaring as the audience probably will be after the first few minutes. I can’t help but think the twins are trying to make a guy’s head explode with their mind. Seriously, whose idea was it to draw them like this, especially the audience surrogate who looks like a girl? He doesn’t just have naturally long hair; it’s fucking stripper-ready-to-be-housewife hair. What’s sad is that that’s the most distinctive thing he has among the cast.

This show is about absolutely nothing, at least K-On! had the goal to start a band. What does this have, high school clubs and awkward pillow talk? Yeah, that reminds me. At least a quarter of the episode is spent on a flashback where the guys bitch about sleeping in the middle of everyone else. Since this is a very common topic for boys to be talking about, it’s the closest we actually get to a plot this week. Argh.

Also, there are cats, which are probably there to remind the fangirls where they’re supposed to touch while ogling at the boys.

1/10 – Dr. Insomniac

Tamayura-Hitotose

Alright, before anything else I’ll admit this much: I have a strong pre-conceived bias against the unofficially titled anime genre known as moe, and even any variations of that (basically anything with a focus on “cutesy” things, usually being young girls doing what are supposed to be cute things). To be fair, while this show has that appearance on the outset its not actually one of those shows. It does try to play off its characters as being cute, but to its credit it at least doesn’t try to resort to any form of fan service (which you should be thankful for considering just how young the 2 main girls in this episode are) like too many other series sporting this type of look seem to love to do. The series instead tries to evoke an “uplifting” feeling from its viewers, which is an emotional response that is certainly very difficult to achieve.

To briefly explain the plot of this first episode: A young girl named Fu Sawatari is someone who was once quite bright and cheerful and loved photography which she was inspired to do by her father, who himself was a professional photographer. Due to certain circumstances he unfortunately passed away and Fu ended up losing her motivation to follow in his foot-steps due to the sad memories taking up his old camera (or any other for that matter) would bring to her. Her best friend Chihiro, a very sensitive girl who pretty much cries at the drop of a hat, also sympathizes with her but tries to support her through her tough times. Eventually upon seeing old photos of her family taken by her father which she had tried to burry away from herself to shun her old memories, she ends up remembering how cheerful she and her family used to be and realizes how much happiness photography brings to her. While it’s a hard decision for both her and Chihiro, she finally decides to move back to her old home town and possibly try and follow in her father’s foot-steps like she always wanted to.

Now, what’s here is honestly a good “concept” for a good set-up for a heartwarming story. Unfortunately, while the writers for this series had the concept down, they failed to deliver on the actual writing part for this particular series, and thus the set-up turns out extremely weak. The first problem is that we learn early on that Fu’s father dies, but we learn nothing about his character or his interactions with Fu and the rest of her family except for the fact that he loved photography and seemed to be a pretty cheerful guy. So right away, there’s no way that we as viewers can be expected to feel sorry for him, and he just becomes a mere figure of the past in this story. What about Fu, can we sympathize with her? Well, unfortunately the writers of this series make the common mistake of assuming that all it takes for viewers to sympathize with a character is for something tragic to have happened to them. I have seen countless cases in which characters in stories have troubled pasts with very close and influential loved ones of theirs having died, and while it may sound sinister I’ve grown a bit too desensitized to that. That is to say, just seeing that isn’t enough to get my sympathy. I actually need to connect with the characters to feel bad, good, or any sort of emotion for them.

Fu isn’t necessarily unlikeable, and her semi-depressed state in the 1st episode is certainly understandable, but her problem is that she’s just far too bland as a character. I felt more like falling asleep listening to her talk and narrate the story in her monotone voice (it didn’t even feel convincingly sad), rather than sorry for her. Her best friend Chihiro on the other hand is a complete mess of a character. I can’t tell if the writers were trying to make her funny or seriously sympathetic when they decided to make one of her defining characteristics being too sensitive to the point of tears at anything even remotely sad, but her character doesn’t work in either regard. She merely comes off as more of an annoyance than any proper support for Fu as her best friend, and once again, we have a character with no real personality to her aside from that one gimmick. Fu’s mother and younger sibling get even less time and characterization in the episode so as far as I’m concerned they are just as 1-dimensional as the rest of the background.

To me, Tamayura-Hitotose’s problem is that it’s just flat-out boring. It’s not offensive or disturbing like other cutesy series try to be, and it doesn’t try to go the humorous route with this type of story either, and to be fair it doesn’t feel like it was a completely effortless series to make (the art design is actually quite nice for the genre, and the animation is at least decent), but it gives the viewer absolutely nothing to be invested in or entertained by. While there are certainly much worse series’ premieres out this season, it doesn’t really excuse the extremely lackluster execution of a series like this, which essentially leaves no real reason for you to come back to this series after the first episode, unless you are REALLY into series with these sorts of character designs. So, yeah, if this series doesn’t look like something that you would normally enjoy, that’s because you won’t enjoy it, so I really can’t find any audience that I would actually recommend this to. – Ensatsu-ken

Persona 4: The Animation

Persona 4 is a very popular RPG in Japan due to its incredible sense of style and the unique world of Personas (magical beings powered from the soul) and social elements in it. Naturally, being one of Atlus’ biggest games, they’d take it to anime. And that’s exactly what you’ve got here. Since Persona 4 itself was made with many different anime staples in it, the transition to anime is almost unsettlingly natural. The premiere episode even opens with the same theme song the game opens with, and it doesn’t even feel jarring at all.

The biggest issues come with the fact that it’s pretty much ripped wholesale from the game. If you’ve played the game already, then you have very little to look forward to here as you’ll most likely be seeing things you had already seen, including some of the main character’s dialogue options from it. Speaking of the main character, I know him being a self-insert was the most probable way to keep it true to the games, but it doesn’t really make him an interesting protagonist in the anime and it might grow to become a real problem down the line.

Basically, if you’re a Persona fan, just play the game. If you have no intention of playing the game itself and want to watch something a bit different than the onslaught of moe shows this season, give this a shot. It might be for you.

7/10 – Desensitized

Mashiro-Iro Symphony

Alright, now this is just the type of show that easily perplexes me as to why it was even made? Actually, scratch that, these pointless “cutesy” shows must have some audience if they are popular enough to keep getting made in abundant quantities each and every new anime season. So then the real question becomes WHY do they even have an audience? Well, whatever the reason, I had to sit though an episode of this shit and believe me when I say that even doing that has become a huge chore in an of itself.

So the plot, or lack thereof, starts off with a boy (Boy A) and his younger sister (Girl A) who is lost. I would refer to these characters by their names but since they are too shallow to even establish any actual “characteristics” about them, I can’t see them as characters and can’t be bothered to remember or even care what the fuck they are called, so instead I will refer to the characters by gender and assigned letters based on the order that they appear. Apparently his sister gets lost easily so she calls him to come and pick her up. He asks her to text him a picture of her location so he can determine where she is (why he doesn’t just ask her to read a nearby streeth sign or something is beyond me), in which case she takes a picture of herself making a cutesy smile (with some sign being obscured in the back corner) and her older brother fondly smiles at it and then notices her location, and tells her that he’ll be there soon and informs her not to move.

Of course, what should be a simple enough task turns into a problem because Girl A finds a stupid cat-like thing that I suppose is supposed to seem cute and then does exactly what her brother told her not to do just 10 seconds ago (I’m not even exaggerating the time elapse here) and moves from her location to follow this random creature thing. I should point out that all that I was thinking about at this point would be how cool it was that the creature turned out to be some extraturrestrial alien life-form that takes on a cute appearance and then lures its annoying victims to dark corners to devour them as punishment for their incompetence, and thus a series of more interesting characters are brought into investigate such instances. Now that would be a fucking awesome series!….But, unfortunately this series is as boring and predictable as you’d expect and after a few moments Girl A realizes that she’s lost (again) and calls her brother (again) informing him that she’s more lost, describing that in her new location she sees a mountain (because, you know, something all the way in the background on the horizon is a brilliant location marker for someone who is probably less than a mile away and has the exact same fucking view as you of such large and distant objects).

After this Girl A’s cell phone runs out of batteries (gee, maybe if she wasn’t wasting time texting pointless pictures of herself and following some unidentified cat-like animal she could have avoided this problem), and then shortly after that it starts raining which worries Boy A (because….that’s the most threatening and serious problem that a show like this can come up with….are you really surprised as this point?). Luckily for Girl A a passerby with an umbrella (Girl B) comes to her aid and allows her to use her cell phone to call her brother again. Then she gives the phone back to Girl B who has a pointless conversation with Boy A which I guess is supposed to start the set up for some sort of romantic relationship between them or some shit like that. After that he FINALLY finds them (and BTW, this stupid problem that could easily have been avoided takes up more than half of the episode, alone) and then the rain just suddenly stops, and he also has some more pointless dialogue with Girl B and apologizes for Girl A’s stupidity (literally the only smart thing said in this entire episode, and probably this entire series by the time its done airing).

Later on Boy A is taking a bath and letting his wet clothes dry (despite the fact that he looked perfectly dry from head to toe, even when it was raining), and then his sister, Girl A steps into the bathroom and says that she will bathe with him and then he makes awkward faces and says that its unnatural but Girl A uses her monotone voice and says its just brother and sister bathing, and then he repeats that its unnatural putting on his awkward face again. I think the writers of this series consider this to be comedy or something….

So, to wrap things up it turns out that 90% of what happened in that episode has absolutely no relevance to the main plot. And yeah, apparently this show DOES have a main plot, but just what is that main plot?….Well, let’s see: You find out that Boy A goes to an all boys school and Girl B goes to an all girls school and both of those schools happen to be doing some sort of exchange program for whatever reason. Boy A and his friend (Boy B) are both assigned to attend that school for the semester, and upon entering they find that all of the girls are dressed like maids. In my experiences in this genre this shit is pretty standard so I’m not even going to bother questioning it this time because its pointless either way? Anyways, the girl they meet (Girl C, I guess), leads them to the main hall where they are supposed to be welcomed by some student representatives and then Girl B stumbles out and both her and Boy A immediately recognize each other, but Girl B’s kinder experession turns into one full of content and she exclaims that just because the schools approve of this exchange doesn’t mean that the students do, and she says that she will not accept boys in the school, and then the episode ends.

Yeah, that’s basically supposed to be the premire episode’s attempt at a cliffhanger that will keep you coming back for more. Will Girl B come to accept Boy A and other boys attending this school? But the real question should be: Do you really give a shit?

So, yeah, fuck this show. – Ensatsu-ken

Mobile Suit Gundam AGE

Another season passes, and it’s time for the legendary Gundam series to make its reappearance! Gundam has been a bit shaky in recent years (aside from the extremely well received Unicorn OVA), but Gundam AGE has billed itself as sort of a new start of sorts…. Again. I mean, it’s not like we haven’t been told this before with Gundam Seed or even way back when G Gundam aired, but this time the aim really is a bit different.

This time instead of going for a more modern approach like Seed or hot blooded shonen craziness with G, they decided to aim for the kids with this one. Essentially imagine Beyblade or Bakugan or similar shows only with their respective battle gimmicks replaced with Gundam battles and you’ll be pretty close. I can understand their reasoning for making this show, the problem is that there is really nothing here for either Gundam fans that they haven’t seen before, or sci-fi/action fans as it does little they also haven’t also seen a million times. In other words, they turned Gundam -the seminal mecha series, into a generic giant mech show giving it pretty much no flavor whatsoever.

Basically, if you’re looking for new Gundam, check out Unicorn which is probably what you want out of the franchise. But on the flip side, if you have kids or younger siblings, then this might be a good entry title.

5/10 – Desensitized

Mirai Nikki

The almighty god of time and space, otherwise known as Norio Wakamoto, bestows upon an antisocial kid the power to predict the future with his cell phone. Initially using it for trivial matters like scoring on tests or avoiding bullies, he stumbles upon a plot to kill him in order to ascend godhood. On top of this, he gets a psycho girlfriend to boot. Ladies and gentlemen, FML: The Anime.

In a change of pace, I actually liked a first episode. Sure, it plods and only gets good around the second half, but compared to the rest of the season, that makes it a success. The plot and setting feels very akin to Death Note and Eden of the East, with the main character definitely an apple’s throw away from the Shinji Ikari archetype. The idea of a kid having to play chessmaster with predictions in order to save his own ass surely shows great potential. And while I already knew her reputation through visiting the odd site or two, Yuno had a unique flair to her. There are a few times where she makes Rena or Mion look sane. I would definitely make sure to watch this show, or at least read the manga.

It could’ve done without some of the Deus Ex Machina parts though. They felt more like exposition moments instead of elements that could have moved and opened the plot for viewers.

7/10 – Dr. Insomniac

Guilty Crown

Some high school kid laments on how he has to reside in a pseudo-futuristic Japan; ruled with an iron fist by its international overlords. But on one day, he finds a mysterious girl in odd wear that must be rescued from the aforementioned iron fist and its evil, one-note army. As these men decide to destroy a city with their mechs and kill bystanders for shits and giggles, the girl offers the kid a superpower, symbolized with a mark on his body, which gives him the ability to slaughter his foes without breaking a sweat. With these powers in hand, our protagonist has started the surge against totalitarianism with him and a bunch of resistance fighters.

No, this isn’t Code Geass. It really isn’t. See, the girl on this show has pink hair instead of green hair. That makes it absolutely different.

Oh, who am I kidding? This show is derivative and pandering as all hell. The lead looks like the one from High School of the Dead, who looks like the one from Busou Renkin. It all starts with a song whose purpose is to get fanboys into buying the OST. We get a half-naked, high-pitched girl sure to have her image printed on dozens of body pillows. Everything about this show is calculated to get the most sales and attention, not to see how far it can go in terms of quality.

And since it decided to copy Code Geass, it also decided to rip off its antagonists wholesale with trigger-happy bastards that we’re expected to hiss at. If you’re going to have sociopathic soldiers that will unanimously kill civilians with absolutely no motive behind the attack other than mere orders and generic bloodlust, then why not just have robots with elementary AI as the henchmen? Having them commit atrocities just so we know to side with the protagonists just speaks poorly for both sides. So I’m supposed to sympathize with the main cast because they don’t shoot innocent people, not due to their attributes or personalities?

Even if the villains have to be unlikable bastards, at least make them interesting beyond “generic Reich knockoff”. Give them a face, a name, a personality, and some charm like Gauron and Ladd Russo. Maybe I’m wrong, maybe I’m ranting about it too much, but I just think it hurts a show like this if the antagonists end up being poorly thought-out bastards for the sake of being poorly thought-out bastards.

That said, the protagonist certainly isn’t a Lelouch clone, and not seeing a Kallen knockoff anywhere around, so the show could possibly branch out from being a copy in favor of being something better. And the striking direction and vibrant soundtrack prove that to be quite possible. It’s just the first impression of this show is disappointing at best, scoff-worthy at worst.

So TL;DR: Superb production values, crappy story.

4/10 – Dr. Insomniac

Un-Go

Seto Kaiba and a creepy tranny dressed as a panda are out to solve mysteries. Yeah, that pretty much sums up the show.

Rather odd to see an episodic anime in a time where even the most trite shows have vague plotlines going on throughout. And while it’s welcoming, it also leaves the series with little impact to offer. The sleuth-solving this episode just seemed to finish before I could actually get involved in it. Nothing from the episode grated me in anyway, but neither did any of it excite me. It did confuse me though (the tranny turning into a sultry woman that reads minds through butterfly-vision, what?). But that doesn’t mean it was mediocre.

I mean, if you like a good mystery story and have been sick of Detective Conan never ending, here’s an alternative. The animation doesn’t seem like BONES’s style, but not in a bad way. The characters, aside from the tranny of course, naturally develop while not coming off as bland. And the direction was all right. For those wanting an anime that tries not to insult your intelligence,

7/10 – Dr. Insomniac

Ben-To:

Normally I’d got into a good amount of detail about the plot of a show before I get down to my thoughts about it. However Ben-To is one of those intentionally ludicrous anime that go to bizarre levels to play out for laughs. As far as story goes in this first episode, it basically just revolves around Yo- Sato-, a high school student who wakes up in the middle of a grocery store to find that he has been beaten unconcious and can’t remember how it happened. One of those annoying girls that you see in other anime of this sort (the hyper-active ones who never shut the fuck up) tags along with him for some reason. Nothing of any signficance really happens until he later finds out that he got beat up by some blue-haired girl (one again, I couldn’t be bothered to remember any actual names in this anime besides the main character’s, but hey, even that’s something coming from me) and presumably various other consumers at the store fighting over half-price ben-to (basically a pre-packaged meal). And….yeah, that’s your plot. Well, there is some crap about him joining some club that the girl is in that I guess has to do with fighting over half-priced ben-to, but its obvious that taking the story seriously in a show like this is irrelivant since its primarily about getting laughs out of its viewers.

Alright, so we have a silly show with over-the-top action and gags and predictably quirky characters. Having to judge it as a comedy, I have to be fair and try to level with it since I understand that comedy is an extremely subjective thing, and I have to admit that I’m REALLY not into these over-the-top nonsensical comedy anime, especially since most of them in recent years have just disguised themselves under that sort of concept when really they just rely on a sleuth of unfunny perverted sexual-themed gags. To be honest I was expecting something similar from this but to its credit it doesn’t rely on these things very much at all for its jokes (this is of course, only going by the first episode). Instead, to my surprise, we do actually get what looks to be some genuine effort into making a wacky show that actually comes off as so ridiculous its funny and entertaining, but the question then becomes whether or not it succeeds at doing this.

Well, like I said, comedy being as subjective as it is, I can’t really speak for anyone but myself in this case. I will actually admit to having chuckled maybe 1 or 2 times through the course of this episode (which, once again, is intself saying a lot coming from me in regards to this sort of show), though I get an odd feeling that one of those times was unintentionally funny for me. As for the episode at a whole, the best thing I can really say about it is that it never sunk to any extreme lows that made me want to stop watching immediately, but at the same time it failed to keep me engaged in its humor, so I didn’t really feel compelled to keep watching either. Its not that I don’t “get” the jokes, as there isn’t a whole lot to get, but rather I just find them to be too tame or predictable for my liking, which is not a good sign for a series with a set-up as ridiculous as this one. The characters aren’t so badly designed like in other series of this type that it makes me want to gag, but at the same time they don’t come off as being all that silly either (once again, relative to how ludicrous the set-up is).

I must confess that I don’t watch a lot of shows of this type in the first place due to my general distaste for the genre (the closest thing to it that I’ve completely seen is Excel Saga, and that’s almost nothing like this show, so it makes for a bad comparison), so I don’t even have a good basis to compare it to. If I were to recommend it to anyone, I suppose anyone who actually is a fan of anime comedies with silly plots and characters would be entertained by this, so in that regard its at least worth a shot for that audience, and to its credit it seems to be doing a fine job already of entertaining people with such tastes. However, while its certainly a good deal more entertaining than its piers in this genre, anyone who does not taking a liking to these sorts of comedies most likely won’t find too much here that will keep them interested, even if it is far more tolerable than many other recent series of this type. – Ensatsu-ken

Originally posted on Saturday, October 15, 2011.

You know those teenagers on the internet who constantly boast about how awesome their lives were as a kid, how grade school and Saturday mornings were their milk and honey? I’m not one of them. My childhood sucked. And yet, whenever my dad hit me just for playing with my Megazords a little too much, or those times when my caretaker at daycare told me I was worthless for not knowing the alphabet in the right order, there was always one solace: Looney Tunes.

Beyond Rugrats, Doug, Ren & Stimpy, and the like, I remember sitting in front of the TV with steadfast attention whenever I heard “The Merry-Go-Round Broke Down” or “Merrily We Roll Along” start up. From seeing Marc Anthony cry over having apparently killed that kitten, to watching Henery Hawk torment the hell out of Foghorn, I relished every short and every viewing. And not just due to the jokes or the timelessness, it was the message.

When you get down to it, Looney Tunes has essentially replaced Aesop’s Fables or Grimm’s Fairy Tales as little stories that kids have ingrained in their mind. And instead of giving lessons like “slow but steady wins the race” or “listen to your parents or an evil gypsy with a chicken-house will kill you”, these cartoons laid down the basic idea of how you shouldn’t let brute force and humorless cynicism get the better of you. And such a theme couldn’t be showcased better than in how Bugs bested overzealous hunters, savage gunmen, uncaring planet-destroyers, and a certain, conniving duck.

And contrary to that last word, my favorite short Nasty Quacks perfectly illustrates what I’m talking about by showing Daffy Duck giving his all to make sure some fat; sour-ass sod won’t kick him out of his house. We get to see manipulative pessimism get countered and trampled over by wit, zaniness, and a bit of romance at the end. And combined with some potshots at neglectful parenting, it turned out to be a perfect seven minutes that any kid who didn’t see eye-to-eye with their providers could relate to.

In short, Daffy, Bugs, Porky, Speedy, and the rest helped teach me that I wasn’t alone and that being a little looney could indeed triumph over the morose and forlorn… and then I grew up with an interest in reconnecting to those characters by going to news sites, forums, threads, and the like. It was the equivalent of walking into a mall bathroom during Christmas and finding Santa sodomizing a toddler.

These childhood heroes of mine were mutated into tools for people to judge, to look down upon, and to delude themselves into some sort of faux-elitism. Instead of understanding the fun and charm of these shorts, some have turned it into an overly organized, obsessive, and exclusionist hobby. If you were a kid that didn’t have time to watch LT, or just preferred to watch something that dared to be made after the Eisenhower era, you were viewed as filth in the eyes of the fanboys. And may woe fall upon you for even suggesting to them that you like cartoons made in countries that don’t speak English. Instead of just enjoying the view, they instead compel themselves to collect anything related to Freleng, Jones, Tashlin, and et cetera and stuff it where no one but them will be able to appreciate it. And whenever someone wishes to continue the LT spirit, they get into an utter tizzy and proclaim damnation upon every single detail. Sure, there’s an exception, but only about as rare as treasure in a landfill.

Enraged is not a word that should be used, since that just means stooping to their level. Instead, I would prefer distraught. Distraught over how these bohemian figures I’ve loved as a child have become symbols for the very people they were mocking. It made one sad to go to a LT-based board and finding nothing but spite and unpleasantness, as well as finding people I wanted to talk to about these cartoons ending up being the most humorless jackasses one could ever meet. I can’t even call it ironic, since that would imply humor could be drawn from the situation.

Through a failure to see eye-to-eye, I ended up putting away these childish things and have seldom watched the shorts since future viewings will do nothing but remind me of the kind of people that enjoy them. Even if I do block it out, nothing can really help the fact that acclaim and wonder aside, these are just old cartoons I’ve already seen several times over, and therefore ends up being a tad hard to get excited over used goods. And yet, despite the joy having been lost, I still remember what those endless Merrie Melodies viewings taught me. No matter how much you’re down, no matter what kind of shit people throw at you, you’ll always have an ace up your sleeve.

And I cannot stress any further my respect towards Looney Tunes for teaching me that.

Originally posted on Thursday, September 29, 2011.

When people say “anime,” the types of shows that come tomind are usually something including robots, people punching each other, and/orgirls in sailor suits. Usagi Drop,while not the best anime out there definitely stood its ground in a time when moe is dominating the market.

Enter Daikichi—he’s not exactly a bum, but he’s not exactlythe picture of perfection either. He’s single and in his thirties, holding up areasonably good job, and he’s just fine with that. You’d expect that lastsentence to be followed with something starting with an “until,” but josei don’t really work that way.

Enter Rin—the six year old illegitimate child of Daikichi’srecently deceased grandfather. The rest of Dai’s family isn’t exactly pleasedwhen they find out such news following a death in the family, leading Rin to bein quite the situation until Daikichi makes the snap-decision to tend to who istechnically his aunt.

What follows is a series made of some of the mosttrue-to-life and heartwarming moments in a time in television when childhood isstarting to take a backseat to the more appealing yet still awkward angstyteenage years. You’d assume that Daikichi and Rin are both at a loss forsomething that the other is able to complete, but to say that would cheapenthings significantly. Daikichi is in a position in his life where raising achild wouldn’t drastically hurt him, nor would it benefit him, either. Ifanything, one would think Rin to be the needier of the two, but upon actuallyinteracting together, she comes off as the more independent one. Bothcharacters don’t necessarily need to rely on the other, but they do so anyway,making for an interesting relationship between caretaker and child.

As the series progresses, the duo is faced with day-to-daychallenges, such as the daily commute, grocery shopping, and basically gettingthrough life as a whole. It’s not exactly “slice-of-life” in the way thatsomething like Lucky Star isconsidered. Rather, it relies on how the two act as a unit to surpass theirproblems, giving warm-fuzzies to anyone watching. I wouldn’t exactly call thema team, but it’s not like the two are lone-wolf types that set theirdifferences aside for the greater good, either; it’s a portrayal of real lifeproblems in a realistic manner, which I found enjoyable enough.

Where the series starts to flounder, however, is in itssupporting characters. With Daikichi’s parents and sister, his co-workers,parents of Rin’s classmates, not to mention Rin’s real mother, there are justso many possibilities for how the story can progress, yet so little actual useof the supporting characters themselves besides the one time they wereintroduced. You’d think that with the source material manga being over and donewith by the time the anime began that some liberties would be taken in somecharacters and story-progression, but no. Instead, what we get is an animatedversion of the first four volumes of the series, nearly verbatim (or whateverthe manga to anime version of that word would be). While I do applaud thedecision to stop the series early in favor of avoiding the more awkward latervolumes, I would have enjoyed the decision a lot more if the anime tried harderto become a separate entity from its source. I mean… it worked for Yu Yu Hakusho.

As a whole, UsagiDrop isn’t the best series in the history of anime, but at 11 episodes, itdoes provide as a nice dose of something new. And with the live-action Lserving as the live-action Daikichi in the movie version of the series, youmust admit that you’re at least somewhat curious about it.

(For more of my Episodic Reviews of the series, check out my personal blog. It’s like my own personal spin-off of the AR Blog.)

Originally posted on Saturday, September 24, 2011.

I’m not gonna lie and say that I remember the exact date that Toonami went off the air in America. On the contrary, it’s all a blur to me—I remember I was in high school, and I remember finding out somehow that that night would be Toonami’s last airing (Pacific timer, so I probably found out from someone online, or a commercial, or something) and not really feeling that much more past that. In general, I watched the action block for the anime and skipped out on any Cartoon Network originals (Teen Titans was in its final season, and I think we’ve all reached a general consensus on how that season was), but at the least I figured I’d park it that night in front of the TV and watch everything go down.

And so it happened. A random episode of Samurai Jack was the last to play before TOM and his new little sidekicks literally said their final goodbyes and referenced Bebop before the parental warning showed up for the [adult swim] block.

Checking Wikipedia, it looks like it’s been a good 3 years this month since then, so I figured a “State of the Channel” sort of post seems in order.

Let me further postpone getting to the guts of this post by saying that a good number of people will argue that Nickelodeon’s early broadcasting format was seen as one of the better ones it’s had—a healthy balance of pretty much every genre kids and preteens would be interested in, from game shows like Double Dare and Legends of the Hidden Temple, to live action shows like Hey Dude and Salute Your Shorts, to their Nicktoons of varying levels of insanity. Three years after what was arguably their most popular programming block was cancelled, Cartoon Network seems to follow suit, with a wide variety of game shows, live action shows, and off-the-wall-type original cartoons. And yet for some reason, it hasn’t received similar amounts of praise. This can be explained in one of two ways: nostalgia glasses making anything old better than anything new, and well… the fact that the channel itself is called Cartoon Network, thus making any and all signs of live action anything serving as the equivalent of spitting in the viewers’ faces.

But regardless of the drama following Toonami’s cancellation, it seems like CN has gotten past any fan backlash and has been able to follow up with their promise of original-to-the-network shows—cartoons included. You’ve got the hipster-popular Adventure Time, the awkward-because-it’s-not-Animaniacs MAD, the awkward-because-it’s-not-The-Office Looney Tunes Show, the underappreciated-because-it’s-not-Adventure-Time Regular Show, and the surprisingly-good-because-it’s-quirky The Amazing World of Gumball… nothing spectacular, but nothing too bad.

Following the death of Toonami was word that the previous change in the network’s head from Jim Samples to Stuart Snyder would lead to an “anti-anime” movement throughout the channel as a whole, explaining Toonami’s fate as well as the treatment of popular Japanese titles such as Yu Yu Hakusho being shafted to a 5AM time slot. Regardless of the shift in presidents, however, it seems like anime are doing okay enough, forming a good majority of the [adult swim] block with newer (granted, not as new as some fans would want) titles such as Bleach, FMA: Brotherhood, and Durarara!! airing alongside the old reliable anime series Cowboy Bebop.

But what seems to be the most significant change so far has to be the channel’s treatment of action series. While I haven’t been the closest of viewers over the past three years (it’s weird to find that my big 3 channels have become AMC, Travel Channel and Bio), I will say that I’ve seen enough on CN to notice that focus during the day has primarily gone to its original comedy shows, giving minimum commercial time for things like Star Wars: Clone Wars, Young Justice, Generator Rex and the like, which is a real shame. I remember a time in Cartoon Network’s history where commercials combining all their shows into one “universe” of sorts existed; a world where each show existed and interacted with each other in a strange harmony of sorts.

Today, I’m lucky if I’m able to find out when the next Young Justice or Mystery Inc. airs without having to resort to an online search.

So in some ways, I guess you can say that some fan doomsday predictions came true, what with a change in power leading to a change in focus for the channel. Then I think, “What would Toonami’s Optimus Prime host say?”

Like all crappy things, time will heal all wounds. And hopefully, by the time the scar left from the removal of Toonami fades, we’ll have a Cartoon Network that old school and new school alike will be proud of.

Originally posted on Monday, September 5, 2011.

Episode 2: Class-Representative Selection Match

For the record, I’m not actually expecting this show to be… well, ‘ya know, good, at any point during the course of its 12-episode run. Going into a series that I was already told beforehand would suck, I’m naturally expecting the worst of the worst at the turn of every frame. That said, I am, however, expecting the 11 remaining episodes to not be as dreadfully boring as the first. After all, this is supposed to be an action series (or, at least, a softcore titty hentai series with underlying action elements). Does Episode 2 deliver? Let’s fiiiiind out!

…aaaaand in this corner, it’s the Badass Brit clad in Bluuuuueeeee!

Revelation time! As it would happen, the school seems to have “run out” of extra stock IS suits, so to compensate, the Japanese government will apparently be providing our boy Ich with his very own “personal” IS. Oh joy! The difference between the two suit models (stock and personal) is never truly elaborated upon, but I digress. Resident braggart Cecilia Alcott then struts onto the scene, largely regurgitating a number of things we already knew from Episode 1; that she’s awesome, that she’s British, and that she’s one badass motherfucker when she’s piloting an IS. Yawn. In the midst of all this shameless ego boosting, we do get another sprinkling of IS history and universal folklore; apparently, only 467 of these things exist WORLDWIDE, which is, of course, a staggering ratio in contrast to the human population of over six billion. Only the elite of the elite are privileged enough to have their very own, as she so candidly puts it. I dunno; if I were her, I’d think the fact that a dunderhead like Ichika is getting HIS own suit, which essentially puts him in the same upper echelon that she’s supposedly in, would kinda take the starch out of the whole thing… but again, I digress.

More IS history ensues, courtesy of Miss Yamada. Most of it comes down to boring, technical aspects of how an IS operates, 99.9% of which Ichika does not understand whatsoever. For apparently being able to operate one of these things himself, he sure is dense. One other tidbit of information also slips, in that Houki Shinonono (Ich’s roomie, remember?) is apparently related to THE person who builds IS suits in this very day and age, a Dr. Tabane Shinonono. I don’t know what ass they are randomly pulling this stuff out of, but I seem to recall it being said in Episode 1 that these things are manufactured by government entities for space travel (which later reverts to Olympic sport after that endeavor fails). I guess after the whole space thing failed, they harbored off the technology to outside minds. Or something; I don’t know, and I don’t even care. I suppose it’s just a convenience factor for them to invent characters on the fly, and making Houki fairly knowledgeable in how an IS operates does help to further along her relationship with Ichika (you’ll see why this is important shortly). I shouldn’t be surprised.

It is around this time that we are also treated to what might possibly be the worst scene in the entire episode. Oh, who am I kidding; it IS the worst scene. It’s not important, but I’m going to mention it anyway, because it pissed me off THAT much. Yep, you guessed it; comic relief gone horribly, horribly wrong. Random Girl #22A in class asks ol’ Yamsy if thinking of an IS suit as a “partner” is the same as thinking of it as a boyfriend, or something idiotic like that (because Yamada told the class to think of the IS as a partner, as opposed to “just a tool”). It is then implied that Yamada is, in fact, a virgin (and with hooters THAT size; who knew?), and the girls in class all squeal, call her cute, make dumb jokes, giggle uncontrollably… and I die a little inside. So far, this show tends to be more boring than bad, but other times, it’s just an absolutely pitiful excuse for entertainment.

Ichika has his sights on Houki shortly afterward, who sits alone with her thoughts. He invites her to eat lunch with him, which she coldly declines. He also invites a bunch of other girls, who do just the opposite. THOSE girls aren’t what he’s interested in, though, and his persistence in getting Houki to join in the merriment costs him a swift punch to the ground, and plenty of humble pie to go around for having his ass handed to him by a girl. She’s a bit taken back at how much weaker he’s apparently become (the two were in the same Kendo class, if you remember), but that doesn’t stop him from trying to get her to join him. Ich then grabs her by the hand, and actually drags her down to the lunchroom with him… and she DOESN’T resist this time! Not only that (and this next part really gets me), but as he’s holding her hand, the faint signs of Houki falling for our absent-minded hero are written all over her face. I still don’t know how she suddenly goes from decking him to the floor, to being slightly turned on by such a simple gesture, but whatever. It’s a show about people flying around in robot suits; it’s not supposed to make sense.

Lunch is rather boring, so we’ll skip that. If you must know, the only major event of remote importance here is that Houki offers to teach Ichika how to properly operate an IS, as he frets over his impending match with Cecilia. This doesn’t actually happen, mind you; Houki instead proceeds to kick Ichika’s ass at Kendo for about a week or so, insisting that he isn’t strong enough to operate an IS in his current state. When the actual suit is doing the bulk of the fighting FOR you, one wonders exactly why any of these measures of physical strength are considered important, but I’ve learned by now that asking questions only leads to more questions. It’s best to just assume that every character OTHER than Ichika is right; he is an idiot, after all.

Nowwwwwwwwww we’re getting somewhere, and it only took 14 grueling minutes! Ichika’s personal IS battle suit has finally arrived, and in spite of learning a whole lot of nothing on how to actually operate it, he’s ready anyway. The fight is about to begin; with Yamada and Chifuyu manning the control the tower, and Cecilia awaiting outside, Ich blasts off, as the ass-kicking of a lifetime surely awaits him. Cecilia offers him one final out-clause, saying that if he apologizes and forfeits the match, she won’t annihilate him. Ichika rebuffs her proposal, and the fight is underway. Cue lasers!

Ooooohooooo, that’s gotta hurt, Gene!

It’s pretty much back and forth action here. Actually, scratch that; it’s pretty much “Cecilia fires a bunch of lasers at Ichika, and he runs away several times” here. Yeah, that’s more like it. For being totally dense as to how an IS operates, though, Ich can and does maneuver out there quite nicely. Guess he really DOES have some past experience in piloting these things; honestly, for a while there, I was starting to think it was all BS. Even Cecilia is, surprisingly enough, in awe at how well he’s holding up.

Deciding to finally go on the offensive after she’s blasted him for the 3rd or 4th time, Ich draws out a new weapon, a “laser sword” of sorts (it’s the official IS lightsaber! Yeah!), and locks on his target. After making a slightly ridiculous, yet also noble, speech about how he’s going to start “protecting his badass, Olympic IS champion sister” or something like that, he makes his move. Just as he’s about to lay the death blow into Cecilia with his lightsaber, the buzzer sounds. Ich has just lost the match; apparently, that latest maneuver drained his suit of all of its “shield energy”, and the ironclad rules of IS clearly state that when a contestants shield energy runs dry, the match is over, and they automatically lose. Yamada and Chifuyu break down the situation during the next scene with excruciating detail… but I’m really not in the mood to get into specifics. Basically, long story short, Ich made the mistake of using something called the “Barrier-Disabling Attack”, which drained all of his shield energy. For whatever reason, this is a no-go in IS battle… and thus, Ich loses, and Cecilia wins. Sadface.

FINAL SCENE. Houki was impressed with Ichika’s battle skills, and as she continues to think about their recent “hand connection” earlier in the episode, she slowly begins to fall for him more and more (whilst also FINALLY agreeing to properly teach him the in’s and out’s of using an IS). Meanwhile, Cecilia Alcott, rather than reveling in her latest victory, is feeling totally the opposite of what one might expect from her character. Instead of gloating in her typical fashion, she finds herself alone, in the shower… THINKING ABOUT ICHIKA?!?! Say whaaaaaaaaaa? The look on her face says it all; it is strongly implied that Cecilia now has romantic feelings for Ich. Seriously. In the span of ONE episode, Ichika goes from universally reviled from two of the shows central characters, to some kind of secret love interest to the both of them, ala Helga Pataki to Arnold or some sort. As Bill O’Reilly once said, “You Can’t Explain That”.

…aaaaand, that’s all she wrote. We now close the book on Episode 2. I’ll give kudos where credit is due; it was better than Episode 1, I’ll say that much. That doesn’t exactly mean it’s worth watching, though, and I’m still expecting an all downhill ride from here (this is, after all, a harem show… and yet the harem aspects were surprisingly subdued this time, which I am obviously not expecting in future outings). Just be glad I’m the one watching this, and you aren’t. Oh, the things I do for you people…

Originally posted on Friday, September 2, 2011.