One of the great resources in anime fandom of late has been this guy. His charts have become almost indispensable when trying to figure out what to watch in the upcoming anime seasons. Recently, he’s started to compile these charts for previous years and the information that can be gleaned from these charts are extremely interesting and a real eye opener.

Last year, 2008, was the first year of this blog and as a result I watched many shows I probably won’t have otherwise and tried to make sure that I discovered all the “good” anime of a season so I could help other people discover these anime shows. So one of the first things I wanted to figure out was how much of the 2008 anime did I watch in the end.

Percentage of Shows Watched

This is the chart in question that I’m using; you can find it and more here. It lists 130 total anime shows that begun airing in 2008 and looking over these shows I realize there is a handful of shows that are aimed at very young viewers and these shows are never fansubbed, talked about, or licensed so the first step I’m going to do is remove these shows from consideration. I then tabulated how many shows I’ve watched, dropped and completed and I’ll summarize them here.

• 114 total shows (19 from Winter 07/08, 34 from Spring 08, 21 from Summer 08, 37 from Fall 08, 3 from Winter 08/09)
• 50 shows watched (5, 15, 9, 18, 3)
• 19 shows dropped (0, 9, 3, 5, 2)
• 31 shows completed (5, 6, 6, 13, 1)

I should note that the Winter 07/08 season was a season that I essentially took off. I needed the break and the only new show I watched that season while it was airing was Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei s.2. Yes, It is strange that I decided to start a blog during a season I wasn’t actively watching but that just how I like to do things. Because of this, the only shows I watched from this season where ones that I really wanted to see at a later time. This skews some of the results I’ll highlight below.

• Overall watched percentage by season – 26.3% of Winter 07/08, 44.1% of Spring 08, 42.9% of Summer 08, 48.7% of Autumn 08, 100% of Winter 08/09
• Overall watched percentage of 2008 – 43.8%
• Percentage of watched shows that were dropped by season – 0.0%, 60.0%, 33.3%, 28.8%, 66.7%)
• Percentage of watched shows that were dropped in 2008 – 38.0%

While going over the list of shows, I’ve noted that there were a few shows that I still have some interest in catching and could see myself watching at some point in the future, time willing.

• Possible unwatched shows that may be watched in the future by season – 2 from Winter 07/08, 2 from Spring 08, 0 from Summer 08, 4 from Fall 08, 0 from Winter 08/09
• Total unwatched but still interested in shows for 2008 – 8
• 2008 Total of shows watched and possible shows watched in the future – 58 or 50.9% of all 2008 anime shows

This leaves 49.1% of the entire 2008 year of shows as shows that I have not watched nor am I interested in doing so. Just looking at the raw number, it seems like I’m leaving a huge percentage of shows unwatched but looking over the shows the I’ve missed – I don’t think I’m missing much. I wonder how this compares to other anime fans.

Excellent Shows and Strong Seasons

Next, I compiled a list of shows that I consider being the best of 2008 – the titles that I would recommend to other people and would be worthy series to own on DVDs, if possible. I was curious to see how these shows were distributed and if the general thinking about the spring and fall seasons being the strong seasons seemed justified.

• Excellent shows from Winter 07/08 – Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei S.2 and Spice & Wolf – (2)
• Excellent shows from Spring 08 – Wagaya no Oinarisama, Library Wars, Kaiba, Soul Eater, Kurenai (5)
• Excellent shows from Summer 08 – Natsume Yuujin-chou, Birdy the Mighty Decode, Somedays Dreamer’s S.2, Ryouko’s Case Files (4)
• Excellent shows from Fall 08 – Toradora, Clannad S.2, Shikabane Hime:Aka, Ga-Rei:Zero, Mouryou Hako, Kurozuka, Michiko to Hatchin (7)
• Excellents shows from 2008 – 18

Looking at the pure number totals, it appears that the fall season was the strongest season and that’s definitely on way to look at it but I wanted to see it from another perspective.

• Percentage of overall shows that were excellent by season – 10.5% of Winter 07/08, 14.7% of Spring 08, 19.1% of Summer 08, 18.9% of Autumn 08, 0% of Winter 08/09
• Percentage of overall shows that were excellent for 2008 – 15.8%
• Percentage of watched shows that were excellent by season – 40.0%, 33.3%, 44.4%, 38.9%, 0.0%
• Percentage of watched shows that were excellent for 2008 – 36.0%

Looking at the number of excellent shows in the context of the rest of the season shows, it turns out that the Summer season squeaks in front of the fall season as having the highest percentage of excellent shows. If the saying about how only 10% of anything is worth fighting for and the rest is garbage then one can’t complain about the quality of anime from 2008 since it beat that by a bit.

Why It’s Hard To Be a Fan of Anime Without Resorting to Fansubs

I want to say up front that I’m not writing this to defend fansubs per se nor am I trying to pick a fight – it’s been my observation for a while that oftentimes when an anime is announced as being licensed, I’m disappointed because it’s not one that I felt deserved to get licensed and I want to see if this observation is backed up by the data.

The first thing that needed done was to compile a list of what shows where licensed from 2008. I started with the list that animesuki keeps of shows that are licensed and thus they no longer list and then I checked out the various licensing articles from anime news network and finally I checked crunchyroll. I might have missed a couple but they won’t be enough to change the conclusions that I discovered. Onto some data.

• Total number of anime shows licensed from 2008 – 32
• Total number of licensed shows that I watched from 2008 – 13
• Total number of licensed shows that I completed from 2008 – 9
• Total number of licensed shows that I consider excellent shows from 2008 – 5
• Total number of excellent licensed shows that will come out on DVD – 3
• Total number of excellent licensed shows that will be dubbed on DVD – 2

I’ll note here that of the 19 licensed shows that I have not watched, none are on my list of shows that I might be interested in watching so those figures are final. Without running the exact numbers it’s pretty apparent what can be concluded but let’s run the numbers for completeness sake.

• Percentage of total anime shows that were licensed from 2008 – 28.1%
• Percentage of total anime shows that were not licensed from 2008 – 71.9%
• Percentage of licensed shows that I watched – 40.6%
• Percentage of licensed shows that I completed – 28.1%
• Percentage of licensed shows that I consider excellent – 15.6%
• Percentage of excellent licensed shows that will be released on DVD – 9.4%
• Percentage of excellent licensed shows that will be dubbed and released on DVD – 6.25%

The one glaring conclusion that I have to conclude is that the “anime fan” that the North American companies are going after is not me. If they were, I’d expect to see almost all of my excellent shows as having been licensed. (Afterall they should be picking the best titles to maximize the number of DVDs bought.) That’s not the case, though, and looking over the shows that did get licensed I find a lot of shounen/fighting shows, fan-service shows, and shoujo shows. I can’t help but feel that one of the results of a licensing pattern like this is that once an anime fan has been sated with enough shounen, fan-service, and/or shoujo shows that these fans discover they are no longer anime fans because anime has become either too childish or repetitive.

The reason I took the category down to excellent licensed shows that will dubbed and put on DVD even when I’m not the biggest dub fan is because there’s a segment of anime fandom that are people who like anime but don’t want to read subtitles and also want to watch on a TV. My one sister is like this and in the end she buys almost exclusively manga because she can find so little anime that interests her. When I was starting up my blog she told me that she’d read my site to find shows to buy but she quickly realized that this was not possible. I don’t blame her, of all the shows that I’ve watched and blogged about in 2008 there is a total of two shows – Soul Eater and Spice & Wolf that I could possibly recommend to her to buy and I don’t think she’d like Soul Eater. That leaves Spice & Wolf as the only anime out of the 114 anime that started airing in Japan during 2008 that I could recommend her to buy.

I feel like I should repeat that; for the entire 2008 year of anime, there is only one anime that I could recommend to my sister as being good enough that it’s worth buying on DVD. And these companies complain about the fans – maybe it’s not the fan’s fault.

I realize that 2009 saw a large increase of shows getting quasi-licensed on crunchyroll so by now it’s possible that my title about having to almost having to resort to fansubs may not hold as much water but I’ll leave that to a follow-up article in the future to see how the numbers work out. I want to hold off for a while to see how many of the 2009 shows get physically licensed and which ones will get dubs. Also left for a later article is my thoughts on how exactly to get the North American anime scene going in the right direction; here’s a hint, I don’t think there will be many people who will become fans of anime from having crunchyroll stream subtitled anime.

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As an aside, if you happen to be looking to buy a good anime series on DVD (maybe for a Christmas present) and want a quality show that will get rewatched more than once, let me point out that Bamboo Blade is coming out soon. And there’s Spice & Wolf as well but it’s coming out the week of Christmas.

Posted in anime, anime rants/views

We’re finally here, the last part of my reflection on the best anime of 2008 – the top 5 anime. If you’ve looked at the other parts then this list probably won’t be much of a shock so let’s not waste anymore time and get to the list.

5 Ga-rei: Zero

The show I called the second most surprising show of the fall season starts this half of the countdown.

I like to see animators willing to take chances with a series because that means creativity isn’t dead. The creators of Ga-rei: Zero could have just done a straight adaptation of the Ga-Rei source material; instead, they decided to create a prequel that would fill in the scant information given in the manga and explain how things got the way they did. Since this would involve a lot of character development and not action, they had to make sure to hook action-philes that might grow bored of the character development and they came up with a doozie. It was probably the best first episode hook since Haruhi and left me completely mystified and wanting to know more.

Overall the show kinda felt like watching the Star Wars prequels because you knew what was going to happen but Ga-Rei: Zero differed in that this show was actually good. I loved the character development, the animation was very well done, top-notch seiyuu work, action scenes where well done and cool weapons. All that and the animators gutsy-ness propelled this show to #5.

4 Bamboo Blade

I absolutely loved Kamina’s voice - Katsuyuki Konishi - and after Gurren Lagann, I wanted to hear more so when I saw that Bamboo Blade was going to feature him as the kendo teacher, I had to watch. After enjoying a few episodes of listening to Kamina’s voice I realized that I actually liked the show itself. It wasn’t a kendo sports show but a show about a group of characters that happened to all belong to the school’s kendo club.

In a lot of ways it’s similar to Wagaya no Oinari-sama. It let the characters drive where the story went, it blended a bit of comedy and drama into itself, and it never tried to be overly complex or forget to be entertaining. Where this show had an edge over Wagaya no Oinari-sama was the kendo actions scenes were suspenseful and generally very well done. I was really sad to see this show end and I hope when there’s enough source material to do a second season that a second season is made.

3 Toradora

I just adore Toradora.

Last year I mentioned that I could believe if someone told me that Gainax sold their souls to the devil in return for Gurren Lagann because it didn’t seem possible that Gainax could do something that great anymore. This year, I could almost believe that J.C. Staff sold their souls over Toradora because they haven’t shown this level of ability for quite a long time and their other show right now, Index, is no match for Toradora either. Is this really the same group of people that mutilated the first half of Shana 2?

I could spend 2000 words praising the different parts of this show that deserve praise like how the characters feel like real people and not clichéd character types or how they never act intentionally dumb to force the story to go in a certain direction or how well the individual episodes flow together or … you get the idea. This is one of the few shows that I think that any anime fan could watch and like a lot, even those fans that hate school-based anime shows. As an aside, I was just reading that the author plans to end the light novels series at 10 volumes so with like 6 episodes left and 7 volumes already covered, we might get a real ending to this anime series.

2 Natsume Yuujinchou

Natsume Yuujinchou, aka Natsume’s Book of Friends, was the best slice-of-life show of 2008 and definitely one of the best of all-time. Watching it felt akin to watching a world class orchestra perform – every note was struck perfectly and nothing felt out-of-place. Even when the show ran, late summer into early fall, helped contribute to giving the show a bit of a melancholic, reflective mood which I associate with good slice-of-life shows.

One aspect I thought real different about this show is that the spirits that appear are mostly very lonely creatures. If they want to harm humans, it’s often because of cruel things that humans have done in the past or because they’ve been lonely so long, they get all twisted up inside. This loneliness reminds Natsume of his own loneliness that being able to see spirits has caused in his life and this pushes Natsume to help these lonely spirits with their problems.

If the second season wasn’t already airing, I’d take this opportunity to complain about how it was only 13 episodes long but it’s running, so I’m happy right now.

1 Kaiba

No other show was discussed more on The Null Set this year then Kaiba and with good reason because it was the best show of the year. The story was definitely intellectual but at the same time it focused that on the individual characters and was able to remain compelling and entertaining. I was surprised on a couple of occasions that this show was able to get me to shed a few tears. The animation was artistic and unique but it never forgot that it needed to tell the story and impress the viewer. I remember there were several sequences that literally made my jaw drop.

I don’t know what else I can say that I already haven’t repeated several times by this point about Kaiba so I’ll just end now saying this show was awesome and one I’d really like to buy on DVD but probably will never see licensed.

Well, that’s it. I hope everyone that took the time to read this look back at the 2008 year of anime found it worthwhile. I tried my hardest to make it so. This year, I’m kinda sad that two of my favorite bloggers, Jason from Derailed by Darry and Jeff Lawson from Hop Step Jump, are taking a break from anime blogging and thus haven’t written their look back at the year. I wouldn’t want to see them forcing themselves to write when they didn’t feel like it but I do miss their writing.

Posted in anime, awards      

Last year I had a single award given to the most memorable moment of 2007. It went to episode 10 of Manabi Straight when it’s revealed that the school festival will be held. This year, I wanted to go a little further in depth to spotlight my favorite episodes and memorable moments. Since I don’t want to spoil a bunch of shows for those readers that haven’t seen them yet, I’m going to just list these without explaining why. First though, there’s a couple final awards that felt like they belonged in this part.

Best Final Episode

Winner: Natsume Yuujinchou

How do you end a slice-of-life show and still give the show a bit of closure that non-structured shows normally don’t have? You do what Natsume Yuujinchou did and bring back several of the characters from the series and reflect upon how Natsume has changed over the course of the series. It simply was perfect.

Best Ending

Winner: Bamboo Blade

The ending of Bamboo Blade was able to walk the fine line that shows based on source material that continues past the end of the anime series has. It was able to give an actual ending that tied up the plot threads introduced in the first season. As well as slipping in a few tantalizing hints at possible plot points if there is a second season without these new characters and stories interfering with the feeling of a satisfying ending.

Best Show No One Saw

Winner: Kaiba

Runner-up: Wagaya no Oinari-sama

If this award was based solely on the number of people that talked about the show then Wagaya no Oinari-sama would have won because I saw far fewer people mentioning this show. Wagaya was a good show and if the animation had looked a little better or if it had come from a more popular studio then it would been a huge hit. Kaiba did get talked about more often but I could tell that outside of the more adventurous viewers and the SF viewers, almost no one watched it. In the end, I gave Kaiba the award because they were both relatively unwatched but Kaiba was a better show.

Memorable Moments

• Ending of episode 1 of Ga-rei: Zero
• Tennis match from episode 18 of Clannad
• The play from episode 22 of Clannad
• Tomoya’s marriage proposal from episode 12 of Clannad season 2
• Iku Kasahara’s media interview from episode 12 of Library War
• Air reference from episode 11 of Zoku Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei
• The race from episode 13 of Toradora
• The Soul Ascension ceremony from episode 5 of Wagaya no Oinari-sama
• Sora’s first official job as a mage from episode 12 of Someday’s Dreamers Season 2

Favorite Episodes

• Episode 26 of Bamboo Blade
• Episode 3 of Kaiba
• Episode 7 of Kaiba
• Episode 52 of Hayate the Combat Butler
• Episode 2 of Natsume Yuujinchou
• Episode 7 of Natsume Yuujinchou
• Episode 9 of Ga-Rei: Zero
• Episode 2 of Toradora
• Episode 4 of Zoku Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei

Next part of my 2008 anime year in review is the first half of my top 10 anime of 2008 and should be posted within the day.

Posted in anime, awards      

Or if I rearranged the words, the VMA Awards or the AMV Awards .

It is certainly possible for an anime show to be good or at least watchable without stellar music, voice acting, or animation; however, it does definitely help. For example, for the first half of Shana 2, the only redeeming features of the show was the well-done OP/ED, Rie Kugimiya as Shana, and the good animation. So this part celebrates those components of an anime that aren’t vital but significantly help it along.

Before I get to the awards I wanted to mention that I’ve been having computer troubles with the computer that’s connected to the internet. Between spending a day trying to fix it so it wouldn’t need a reformat, moving all the important files off so we can reformat and taking this opportunity to finally back up our digital pics onto dvd discs, I haven’t had the time to finish writing these or watch much anime. Luckily, I have an old laptop (it has a Pentium 3 chip in it ) that I can use to keep connected to the internet until it’s fixed.

Top Seiyuu “Discovered”

Winner: Marina Inoue

Yes, Marina Inoue is not a new seiyuu and I’ve liked characters she’s done in the past like Yoko from Gurren Lagann. What’s different is that before this year I never really paid attention to how well she voices her roles and recognizing when it’s her. It was the perfect match of her voice to the character of Kana in Minami-ke that really started my deeper appreciation of her work. From that point, I started to look for her roles and I continued to be impressed with how well she can match her voice with the character’s thoughts and actions.

Best Performance by a Seiyuu

Winner: Rie Kugimiya as Taiga from Toradora

Runner-up: Rikiya Koyama as Kogarashi from Maid Guy

Rie Kugimiya often will play the short tsundere with violent tendencies character in a show. It’s a combination that always will spice a show up and is one of the reasons why she’s one of my favorite voice actors. I figured before Toradora started that she really couldn’t surprise me by doing another short tsundere with violent tendencies role but it became readily apparent that I was wrong. While it’s still obviously her doing Taiga, she’s never been this good before. Some of excellence with Taiga is due to the great story but she’s definitely been a huge factor in taking a well-worn character type and making it feel authentic. When she’s tsun-tsun, her anger fits the situation and when she’s dere-dere, her love-sick attitude is realistic as opposed to when she was Louise in Zero’s Familiar where her personality was artificial and lacked vivacity.

Best Seiyuu

Male: Hiroshi Kamiya

Since no single male voice actor really stood out from the crowd this year, I decided to prepare of a list of favorite performances to see if I could find any overlapping names. Two roles on this list were Natsume from Natsume Yuujinchou and the Sensei from Zoku Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei. I was surprised when I found that Hiroshi Kamiya did both roles. The pair of characters are polar opposites; one’s theatrical, loud, likes to over-react and is prone to huge emotional swings whereas the other is calm, cool under pressure, mature, and considerate of other people. The fact that I didn’t realize or even think to myself that either performance sounded familiar speaks highly of his ability. As does the way he was able to fit his performance and delivery to impeccably match the type of character he’s playing.

Female: Marina Inoue

Marina Inoue kept appearing in shows I watched and kept impressing me with her voice work this year. Often the characters that Marina Inoue voices have to have a very scary and imposing “I’m ticked off” voice in their repertoire. Marina has one of the best angry voices around. When you hear it it’s easy to understand why the other characters wither when being subjected to it. And yet when these same characters are supposed to be happy, Marina can infuse their demeanor with such boisterous happiness that it’s contagious to the viewer. What really impressed me and helped her earn this award is that, even though it’s relatively easy to recognize a Marina Inoue role, each character is distinctly different from each other. For example, Kana from Minami-ke is the sneaky middle sister but Iku Kasahara is the energetic idiot in Library War and Chiri Kitsu is the angry perfectionist in Zoku Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei.

Best Seiyuu Cast

Winner: Zoku Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei

Runner-up: Toradora

Zoku Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei inherited a large number of characters from the first season and added even more characters during it’s run. One of the things that is needed for shows with big casts like this is many distinct voices so it’s easy to pick out who’s saying what. With every additional voice used, though, the chance of duplicating a voice or picking a bad one increases. This problem didn’t plague this show though; in truth, almost every single voice used was unique and well done. I already mentioned Hiroshi Kamiya’s Mr. Despair and Marina Inoue’s character but the list goes on. Of particular note is the illegal immigrant Maria and the student that’s known as Kafuka.

Best Overall Opening

Winner: Kaiba

Runner-up: Zoku Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei

Tastes in music are really subjective to begin with and for me this is compounded even more in regards to anime because I don’t know Japanese. Therefore any category that relates to music is going to subjective.

Kaiba’s opening was great on many levels. It had a song that was good all by itself and it helped get the viewer ready for the show by getting them in the proper state of mind. The animation used showcased many of the characters of the series and helped reinforce some of the core concepts of the series. It was also pretty to look at, which always helps as well.

Best Overall Ending

Winner: Kaiba

Runner-up: Someday’s Dreamers Season 2

The ending got picked for essentially the same reasons that the opening got picked. I do think it’s a bit funny that the same singer of the OP/ED also did the ending to Chaos;Head and just about no one liked that song.

Best Overall Music

Winner: Kaiba

Runner-up: Clannad

If the music in the series is average then I’ll not even notice it enough to form an opinion about it. Therefore, any show that I can remember some of the background music after the fact means it’s above average. The music to both Kaiba and Clannad are used to good effect but it was only Kaiba that had music that actively wowed me while I watched it.

Best Music Soundtrack

Winner: Somedays Dreamer’s Season 2

I often don’t like anime soundtracks even to shows that I liked the music because the full versions of the songs aren’t as good as the parts used in the show. However, I found that I liked the soundtrack to Somedays Dreamer’s Season 2 better then when the pieces where used in the show. One reason why I like this soundtrack is the wide variety of instrumental music genres on it. There’s a couple Celtic songs, a blues rock one and a synth-pop track to name but a few. I also think it’s entirely possible to like this album without ever watching the anime which is another way it’s different from most albums.

Best Animation Style

Winner: Kaiba

Runner-up: Zoku Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei

I think the reason most people thought Kaiba was an experimental anime was because of the odd animation style employed. It certainly does appear odd when looking at screenshots but it’s a totally different story when watching it in motion. I found that the style of the animation works very well with the story, it’s ideas and the overall tone. If the creators had decided on a more realistic or detailed animation style then I really think that it would have been an impediment to the show.

Best Animation

Winner: Kurozuka

Runner-up: Xam’d: Lost Memories

I mentioned earlier that I liked Kurozuka even though it was almost a purely action show. To successfully pull off that type of show and not rely on character development and plot, the action needs to wow us almost continuously. In anime, that also means the animation needs to impress and Madhouse’s Kurozuka impressed. It looked good, it moved good and it was artistic, detailed and imaginative.

Top Animation Studio

Winner: Madhouse

There’s no question that Madhouse deserves this award. No other animation studio had the sheer number of quality shows this year that Madhouse had. Some of there shows included Kaiba, Maid Guy, Kurozuka, Mouryou no Hako, and Chaos;Head. I’m surprised how infrequently their name comes up in the anime community when talking about great animation studios. And I hope 2009 sees more great shows from Madhouse.

Posted in anime, awards, youtube      

Soldiering on, this next set of awards cover some of the many different types of anime out there. I enjoy many of these types of anime and this sometimes leads to odd pairings; for example, I remember watching Kaiba and Maid Guy back-to-back on several occasions. There are a few categories you won’t see like best shounen or best shoujo because I just don’t watch enough to feel confident in those picks. Though I can say that in matters of shounen, Soul Eater is superior to Bleach and probably Naruto but I only watched the first 25 or so episodes of Naruto before I was bored of it – maybe it got better. As for shoujo, I liked Earl and Fairy and Skip Beat so maybe I should watch more.

Best Action

Winner: Kurozuka

Runner-up: Shana 2

Kurozuka is a bit of aberration for me because it never took the time to really do much character development and the story was only the barest of skeletons for most of the series; and yet, I didn’t mind because I was too busy enjoying the polished, pure action series that Kurozuka was. The fights where excellent and I loved when Kuro slipped into vampire bullet-time because I knew he was about to cleave a path of destruction through those around him.

Best Fight

Winner: The Sabrac fight from Shana 2

The best overall fight went to the Sabrac fight towards the end of Shana 2. Anytime a fight lasts for two episodes, it’s going to either feel epic or boring and drawn out; this fight was a stellar example of the first. The first reason is that all the characters where going all out, none of this “I’ll use 43.25 % of my full power” that artificially extends a fight. Another reason is that the good guys had to out-think and plan actual strategy to beat Sabrac and when they did get him, it wasn’t because Sabrac did something stupid to allow them to win. It also helped that by this point in Shana we’ve gotten to really like the good guys so it was like we we’re personally invested in the outcome. And the final thing that really made this an awesome fight was the way Shana and friends finally beat Sabrac, it was unexpected, theatrical, and just plain cool.

Coolest Weapons

Winner: Ga-rei: Zero

Runner-up: Soul Eater

Ga-Rei: Zero had one of the most diverse set of weapons I’ve ever seen. We had the standard sword and guns but we also had a guy wield two suitcases that shot small missiles, a guy that used a weapon that turned his hands into drills, a woman that had a Gatling gun for an artificial leg, a motorcycle that had anti-monster incantations in the tread of the tires – just to name a few. There was several more spare weapons that are shown like an iron that used holy water steam. And even some of the more standard weapons had their own twist like a sword that would use the recoil of discharging a bullet to speed up the user’s swing and also allow the wielder to change directions mid-swing very quickly.

Best Comedy

Winner: Zoku Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei

Runner-up: Maid Guy

The year didn’t have many pure comedy shows that were genuinely funny but it did have many non-comedy shows like Clannad, Toradora, and Natsume Yuujinchou that used humor for great affect. Instead, many of the comedy shows like Kemeko DX and Kannagi tried too hard to either be different or be more then just a comedy show. Maid Guy was one show that did a good job remembering it was a comedy show and if the ending had been stronger, it could have won. Another show that never forgot it was a comedy and still found the time to comment on society and poke fun at people was this year’s best comedy, Zoku Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei. I will admit that this comedy isn’t meant for everybody but it’s unique blend of comedy was something I just love.

Best Slice-of-Life

Winner: Natsume Yuujinchou

Runner-up: Someday’s Dreamers Season 2

You really can’t go wrong with either show but I gave the slight edge to Natsume Yuujinchou, aka Natsume’s Book of Friends, because it gave me a better relaxed slice-of-life feeling and I like the ending more. Natsume excelled at those areas that you’d expect a slice-of-life show to do so such as: interesting characters that develop over time and a story that can make the viewer feel a wide range of emotions. One little thing I particularly enjoyed was how everyone had a different name for Nyanko-sensei.

Best Science Fiction

Winner: Kaiba

Kaiba is a really good example of what’s possible with science fiction. It extrapolated a future to tell a story that would be impossible using our current level of technology but at the same time it was able to make the story resonant with us, the viewers. Another reason I was impressed with Kaiba was that most SF shows can’t match print SF in terms of depth, intellectual complexity, and creativity but Kaiba was able to.

Most Entertaining

Winner: Library War

Runner-up: Wagaya no Oinari-sama

For any type of show to be successful, it needs to entertain on some level so I’m going to define “Most Entertaining” as the show that the best at making me feel good after watching it. Library War wins because I enjoyed the characters and how they interacted with each other. I also thoroughly enjoyed when the Library forces where able to beat the censorship thugs, if only it was so easy in real life.

Best Mind Trip

Winner: Zoku Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei

Watching Zoku Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei is a rather unique experience.

Every aspect of the show seems designed to give the viewer a very surreal feeling. There’s the animation – at times it’s very standard looking and other times it’s hyperstylized or made using various other mediums. Add to that the amount of text we see. Some of it on signs in the background, telling jokes and making references that oftentimes has nothing to do with what’s going on in the foreground. Other text is conjured by the characters to prove a point and will often fly by so quick that it’s only possible to read by pausing individual frames. And let’s not forget the use of a real picture of some guy’s hairy face. (I know he’s connected to the manga but can’t quite remember how right now.) He pops up multiple times in an episode and in various locations; though, he is frequently used when they want to censor something. The show also has a touch of ADD to itself and can feel like the show’s creators are randomly switching channels in their minds. I do mean all this, in the best possible sense because I like the uniqueness of the show – as you’ll see when I get to my actual top ten shows of the year.

Best Story

Winner: Kaiba

Runner-up: Xam’d: Lost Memories

The story of Kaiba accomplished a lot in the time it had. The first half of the show focused on the main character, Kaiba, as he tried to figure out who he was. A more complex question when a person can swap bodies and add/subtract memories from their mind. It also introduced to the viewers many of the problems that mind uploading would present to society. The second half of the show focuses on the efforts of a terrorist group to usurp the king and Kaiba’s effort to reconnect with the woman he loves after her memories have been altered to further the terrorist group’s agenda. One of the things that surprised me was that I had thought, based on the rather experimental animation, that the story would be too artsy for me but it turned out to be very accessible and down-to-earth.

Most Interesting Setting

Winner: Kurozuka

Runner-up: Kaiba

The mix of the familiar with the alien that post-apocaleptic worlds often have is something that has greatly interested me since I was very young. In this case, the world of Kurozuka helped set the proper mood and make the show feel plausible instead of pure fantasy. I’m not saying Kurozuka was plausible; but, like how the recent Batman movies feel more realistic then the previous movies and series, the setting helped give the show a more realistic feel.

Posted in anime, awards      

Ask a fan of science fiction (as defined as someone who reads science fiction) what they would like to see more of in the genre and one popular answer might be more quality SF on television. There is a limit to how often a person can rewatch the same few shows like Firefly, Stargate, and Twilight Zone to satisfy the urge to watch something SF. And heaven forbid if an American SF fan wanted to see realistic cutting edge technology like Augmented Reality or a show that remembered that space is a vacuum.

When I became an anime fan I wasn’t expecting to find shows that where both good anime and good SF but I’ve come across a number of shows that do both. So in the interest of helping non-anime science fiction fans, I thought I’d point out some of the best titles. For each listing I’ll list what type of SF it is, a fairly spoiler free synopsis of the show, and the show’s availability in America.

A final word before moving onto the list. One of the big differences between anime and most American shows – if you’re not familiar with anime - is that in anime, just because the characters are school age, it doesn’t necessarily mean that the show is any less complex then if it had only adults. Granted, in many instances anime can be juvenile but that’s the same as with science fiction – not all of it’s mature but some of it is.

The Girl Who Leapt Through Time

Movie
Type of science fiction – Time travel
Available on DVD – English dub and subtitles

This movie is about a normal high school girl when she suddenly gains the power to travel to the recent past but this isn’t a story about how she saves the world. Instead, this is a story about how she uses this power to improve her life and the consequences of her actions. It starts off good; she uses the power to eat the pudding cup that her sister stole, she goes back to ace a recent quiz and she switches what food she makes during cooking class to name just a few. As time moves forward, though, she sees what the unintended consequences are to her actions and must try to fix what she’s done.

This type of story is by no means unique but what sets this movie apart is the characters are given abundant depth so you sympathize and like them immensely. Also to the movie’s credit, it never gets that contrived and arbitrary feeling many time travel stories get. It somewhat reminds me of a Connie Willis time travel story in that the focus is on the characters and the time travel is just a means to the end.

Dennou Coil

Television Series, 26 Episodes
Type of science fiction – Augmented Reality
Unlicensed * – English subtitles only

Earlier this year I wrote of this show, “Imagine a show that deals of the same cutting edge technology that’s found in works by Charles Stross and Vernor Vinge. Imagine this show centers around characters still in elementary school. Finally, imagine this show running on the Japanese equivalent of America’s PBS station. If you could imagine a show like this then you’ve probably already watched Dennou Coil.” It was hard to imagine that a show with this type of background would ever see the light of day but it did and it was a winner.

The show knows how to balance the light-hearted antics of the kids with the more serious story of one tranfer student’s effort to figure out what happened to her older brother who disappeared while using his AR glasses. This show also did a good job in imagining how AR operate and what new problems would need to be addressed. One of my favorite touches was the mobile anti-virus program that went around the city searching for irregularities in the system and fixing them. Since all the kids hacked their AR glasses to do more, they had to keep away from these programs or else their glasses would get fried and they’d have to get a new pair of glasses.

Kaiba

Television Series, 12 Episodes
Type of science fiction – Total mind and selective memory uploading and transference
Unlicensed * – English subtitles only

Kaiba wakes up at the beginning of episode 1 without any memories. A scan of his mind reveals that his mind literally contains no memories. So he does the logical thing and goes on a quest to figure out who or what he is. Along the way he loses his original body, gains two new ones, sees first hand how mind uploading and transference has altered society and finds out that he’s lost someone that’s important to him.

For all it’s focus on the technology that’s made this society possible, it doesn’t forget that to make a good show one needs characters and a story to tell. It was advertised as a SF/Love story and succeeds on both fronts. So don’t let the odd animation style stop you from watching this exceptional SF show.

Planetes

Television Series, 26 episodes
Type of science fiction – nuclear fusion, moon colonies and mining
Available on DVD – English dub and subtitles

The year is 2075 and space has become dangerously full of space junk. To contend with this problem, governments offer bounties to companies for the removal of debris that would threaten the human activities in space. As you might guess, even governmental bounties do not make this profitable for companies so these companies run their Debris Sections on a shoe-string and duck tape budget. Planetes focuses on one company’s Debris Section and their adventures.

A series about space garbagemen might not sound interesting but it turns out that this series is anything but boring. Some episodes focus on what happens when the space junk turns out to not be junk; for example, in one episode it’s a secret military satellite and in another, it’s the coffin of someone buried in space. Other episodes take place on the moon bases and we get the chance to meet one of the first persons to be born on the moon and see how that affects her outlook on life. Other episodes deal with a terrorist group from the have-not nations that can’t take advantage of nuclear fusion because they can’t afford to mine the moon for fuel like the rich countries and how the paths of our Debris Section and them cross.

And if you still need a reason to watch this show, then let me say that this show remembers that space is a vacuum and sound doesn’t carry.

Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex

Television Series, 52 episodes
Type of science fiction – A.I., prosthetic bodies, mind uploading
Available on DVD – English dub and subtitles

Don’t confuse the television series with the pair of movies – they’re the same franchise but unconnected to each other. I listed the series over the movies because the series has more action, lacks much of snobby philosophizing of the movie, and has the time to better explore it’s futuristic world and the ramifications of it’s advanced technology.

GitS:SAC, as it’s abbreviated, takes place in the near future where mind uploading and entire prosthetic bodies are a reality and almost commonplace. To further blur the line between man and machine, A.I. development has come a long way in creating A.I. that is very humanlike. In this hyperconnected, digital future society it becomes imperative for a government to have crack professionals that can keep it’s citizens safe from the profuse types of cybercrimes of the future. This is where Section 9 - a mix of ex-mercenaries, hackers, and intelligent cops - of the Japanese government comes in.

One of my favorite episodes involves the uploaded brain of a film maker. In physical life, he found it nearly impossible to find the funding to make his movies. To remedy this, he uploaded his mind into a digital braincase where he could create the movie and people could jack in and watch his movies in a virtual movie theater. The problem for Section 9 is that his movies where so good that almost no one wanted to leave – even if that meant their physical bodies died.

So, if you’re looking for a show that is one of best examples of how SF can be entertaining, action-packed, and still intelligent – check out Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex.

Freedom

OVA Series, 7 episodes
Type of science fiction – moon civilization, massive environment cataclysm on Earth
Available on DVD, Blu-Ray – English dub and subtitles

It’s the dawn of the 23^rd century and it’s been a hundred years since a human-triggered environmental cataclysm has supposedly rendered Earth uninhabitable. This has left the couple million inhabitants of the Moon City Eden as the last outpost for humanity. A strictly controlled society is necessary for Eden to survive but the teens of Eden don’t like it and this causes them to frequently get punished. It happens that while inspecting conduits outside as punishment, one of these teens, Takeru, witnesses an object crashing into the Moon’s surface. He rushes over to examine the crash site and his life will be altered forever after he discovers what this object’s cargo was.

This was a fun title to watch and shouldn’t be taken too seriously. One caveat with this title is that originally this was only 6 episodes long and when you watch it, you’ll see how the ending of episode 6 was a natural ending point. Episode 7 was added later on and while it was good to see what happens next, they tried to cover to much in one episode so it felt very rushed. Just a heads-up, this is still a very good show to watch – especially if you like the type of SF where humans overcome adversity in the face of danger.

The next two anime shows might not be science fiction per say but are definitely SF-related and almost guaranteed to be liked by a SF fan.

Kino’s Journey

TV Series, 13 episodes + 2 Stand-alone short movies
TV Series is available on DVD with English dub and subtitles but the short movies remain unlicensed

Kino is a traveler. Travelers spend their life traveling to the many different small city-states that dot the landscape of this earthlike world. For the most part these city-states leave each other alone which has allowed many different types of cities to develop. Some are high-tech, some are decidedly low-tech, and most fall somewhere in the middle. Kino spends only 3 days in any one city, just long enough to get a taste of what makes the city tick but not long enough to want to stay.

This type of set up allows Kino to be presented with many different scenarios that are designed to make the viewer think. For example, in one episode she visits a city that had been locked in a century long war with a neighboring city but fifteen years ago peace was achieved. The citizens are very proud at being able to finally end this war so Kino checks out the History museum. The curator of the museum, a mother who lost her husband and sons to the war, was instrumental – along with a mother on the other side – in ending the war. Their solution involves a yearly contest between the two sides, with a set number of combatants and automatic rifles, in how many people they can kill in a nearby underdeveloped city. The side that kills the most, is that year’s winner. Sounds horrible but as the curator points out, overall the number of people dieing is less and the standard of living in both cities have increased immensely now that the expensive weapons of war no longer have to be made.

Not every episode has a scenario this extreme or depressing but the series will make you think, much like good science fiction. I highly recommend this title.

Millenium Actress

Movie
Available on DVD – English subtitles only

Millenium Actress is one of those titles that are hard to adequately explain. The frame of the movie follows a documentary maker as he interviews an aging film actress about her life. We discover, from the moment she bumps into a fleeing artist/anti-government protestor in the early 1930’s and falls in love with him, that her life has echoed many parts that she played in the movies. This fact might help to explain how during the course of the interview, her recollections seem to bleed into real-life and the documentarian and cameraman find themselves physically watching parts of her life and finding themselves in the movies that she was in.

This might sound a little odd but it makes for a very riveting movie. In fact, as I was writing this I got the urge to watch it again and did so. The reason for it’s inclusion on this list comes from the actress being in SF movies and the use of one of these movies as a metaphor for something I won’t spoil here.

That’s it for the list now. I plan on adding onto this list in the future as I watch other worthy titles so I’ll be giving this post it’s own easily findable page up above.

*It’s relatively easy to find and download unlicensed anime on the internet, subtitled in whatever language you want. I don’t have the space here or desire to argue about fansubs so I will leave it at this. If the show is unlicensed, the only way to get it licensed is if American companies think they can sell enough DVDs so the more people that have seen these unlicensed shows and are talking about them – the greater chance that it’ll get licensed. And if the show is available on DVD and you liked it – buy it so more shows of this type are made. And if you’re unsure about a show and don’t want to spend money on a DVD you won’t like, remember that it’s rentable through a service like Netflix.

Posted in anime, anime rants/views, general anime interst, science fiction      

Can’t really believe that it’s over. And I completed the whole series in the short span of a September! (Maybe a bit more to marathon the first season, though.)

It’s been really entertaining, and I’m kinda sad that it’s ended. What a dramatic ending, with that whole trail of blood down that slope. And I kind of like how he was, as one pixiv image states, The World’s Kindest Liar.

I don’t exactly hope Lulu will be some cart driver though, I don’t see how you deduce that some random cart driver whom I didn’t even consciously notice could be Lulu Resurrected ._.u Imagine that!

*…ALL HAIL CART DRIVER LULU! ALL HAIL CART DRIVER LULU! ALL HAIL CART DRIVER LULU!*

Furthermore, there were so many citizens (in the series) hating him, they wouldn’t want to be relieved for no good reason and forget to make sure he’s dead even if he’s somehow become immortal, right?

Nunnally (the new moe KIRA! character, as illustrated by KL-chan) would feel very cheated of her feelings too.

Hey, but maybe he could have had his soul transferred into Nunnally’s crane and that coulda been what C.C. was praying for and hey, he would have lost his entire harem but he still has C.C. by his side faithfully and she talks to him just like she talked to was-she-dead-or-not Marianne.In short: SUNRISE PLEASE DON’T REVIVE LULU IF YOU DON’T HAVE A GOOD PREMISE which we 48591241562318578922564.34156 fans haven’t figured out yet. What’s that, you say? The classic Deux Ex Machina? Some of us are getting sick of that crap.

Oh, and if Gundam 00 (I wonder if I should even try and catch up to something that’s part of the neverending Gundam franchise) is raking in enough from fujoshis and Gundam fanboys already, you don’t have to repeat the plot in CG, if what I hear about the similarities in plot/ending are correct.

Speaking of Gundam… Let me blind you with something interesting.

 

 

Speaking of that KIRA! meme, why hasn’t anyone done a crossover of Death Note and Macross?? (Or at least I haven’t seen any around.) I’d totally want to see Raiko and Lko doing that weird shineyshineyshiney thing. Instead of a mic they could be holding a deadly pen and preparing to have a deathnotegasm.

**SAKUJOU! SAKUJOU! SAKUJOU! made me rofl like crazy even though I didn’t continue the anime series after that.

…Please, let me blind you again?

…

Alright, I won’t blind you anymore. I’ve been lurking pixiv and doing random stuff on lang-8 while neglecting my math. I’ve also been majorly mindscrewed by physics and I don’t know what to do to prepare for CHINESEDOOM and ENGLISHAGHWHYCAN’TISCORE tomorrow. I swear, I should have been in the Chinese stream and not the Higher Chinese stream.

 

 

 

There’s a hell lot more decent fanart on pixiv (heck, I’m starting to get the feeling they’re all professionals but that can’t be true dammit you Japanese) ..I don’t mean the stuff I strike out, by the way.. and anyway I figured I should leave it to you guys to just go and find out for yourselves on pixiv Quite a lot are cute/ moe, quite a few pretty, a handful pretty hot, a few DANGITAMAZINGHOWDIDYOUDOTHAT and a lot of them really well-drawn. There are shitloads of KIRA! parodies

+ Code Geass is like totally owning the Top 100 Bookmarked Images list there.

Last one for the lulz:

 

      

Give it a try I finished the whole series (12 episodes) in just about 3 days – that’s pretty darned fast, don’t you think? And meanwhile, I haven’t even got to finishing up Manabi Straight or other 12-episode semi-recommended series. Of course, the compromise made in terms of time means my grades are pretty screwed this year. Twice over as compared to midyears. Last year was much better, trust me on that one.

Not to digress, though, I think Kaiba is really one of the rarer finds (or maybe it’s because I’ve been watching all sorts of crap or not watching at all). I think Surreal describes the setting perfectly, but it seems to go deeper than that. Oh, and the ending is Confusing, unless it’s just me. I also think Cartoon for Adults or for the more mature sort of fits Kaiba well.

Oh and by the way, I think one other reason why I love Kaiba is that his colours remind me of Link. ORZ WTF SELF |D

In terms of graphics, the art style is very cartoony; not moe, but nowhere near realistic–realistic referring to the style which GONZO (or whatever other animation studio, since I’m not too familiar with them all) usually chooses to use nowadays, and the style which most series with above-average animation use. I got put off by the art style/ ignored it at first because of how kiddy it seemed. Despite the cartoony feel, though, I don’t really mind it now. In fact, I find it pretty interesting, and cute in other ways. The animation was very fluid, too, which is probably more of why I could accept the style and actually love it, in addition to unique and distinct character designs. The production studio is Madhouse btw. Either way the pictures’ll speak ten thousand words.

What I find especially interesting is that the unique, cartoonish art style belies quite a mature theme and overall feel, which is most felt later on in the series… For example there is quite a bit of ‘blood’ or rather green or purple or orange funky-coloured organic fluid that spews out due to conflicts :\ and there was this part pretty early on in the series to do with sex. Not presented in a very tasteful manner since that wasn’t the point, but I exceptionally found the context in this case quite disturbing. You’ll know what I mean once you watch it, it should be in the first 2 or 3 episodes..

In terms of music, it mostly uses one main theme (except for action scenes) with quite a few/a lot of variations of it to convey a slightly different mood. Quite fittingly, may I add. Most are engrishy and serene.

As for the voice-acting… Generally quite suitable and well-done imo. Kaiba, who is the main character, is voiced by Kuwashima Houko. She is probably best known as Tomoyo in Clannad and Sango in Inuyasha. Oh, and also Michiru in Zombie-Loan, which I just kind of picked up, and now I can’t stop thinking of her as a guy when I hear her voice. Yep, here goes a ‘wtf self?!’. The second-most main character is Neiro, voiced by Noto Mamiko. The name should at least sound a little familiar.. She was Kotomi in Clannad, Ana in Ichigo Mashimaro (yet another yet-to-complete series) and Enma Ai in Jigoku Shoujo. Ring a few bells now?

Special mention for Paku Romi who voice-acts Popo, a secondary character though more major only later on. Her voice almost ALWAYS makes me automatically register the character as a guy first orz even though she still does female roles now and then like Kuchiha in Amatsuki. (I haven’t been catching up on the anime or manga ever since, because it’s kinda incoherent although that’s true for me too.) Anyway as I said, Popo doesn’t play too major a role in the first part of the series, but later on he gets to be a major asshole, also spelt ‘retard’ in this case.. Look out for that one. You might better know Paku Romi as Edward from FMA, Hitsugaya from Bleach, Temari from Naruto, Teresa from Claymore amongst some other popular roles. She does it pretty well imo except maybe the ever occasional screaming/shrieking parts…?

And, as a bonus if anyone’s interested in the voice of that cute girl Chroniko, Saito Chiwa most notably voiced Lavie from Last Exile, otherwise I only know her as Yuuta from Zombie-Loan. I actually wasn’t paying very much attention to her voice… And who cares about Vanilla lol

Okay enough of all this rambling though. Although, I guess you could count it as a trademark of mine 89 |D If you’re wondering about the plot, the style kind of changes slightly as more revelations take place.

I should start by introducing the premise of the entire series.. So. Kaiba’s lost his memory, and to get it back, he needs to know more about the world he’s in. The thing is, in the world the series is set in, there’s this guy called Warp, the King, who invented a system in which memories of any individual could be stored in a chip. Even if you die, as long as the chip is unharmed, if the chip is placed into another body, that individual will still live life in the same way as before, except for any major physical differences in which it would simply be more difficult to get used to life again.

At first, Kaiba’s just trying to make sense of everything he’s thrown into, gets chased, and ends up going on a little trip to different planets (yep this part reminded me of Le Petit Prince which I was forced to read in CHINESE of all blasted things) where the audience learns more about the world of Kaiba through Kaiba’s new experiences and memories. But later on as he gets to know more and more is thus revealed, the plot just thickens on a whole new level and there are more things like politics, clones, romance, rebellion etc. There are also a lot of plot twists and major revelations nearing the end, which isn’t always a good thing :\ I think I got lost at the final episode of the series, though I still enjoyed it as a whole.

In a sense, you could take it that this series is essentially simply there to answer the What Ifs if technology advanced to such a level/ major implications of a major What If question. It’s more of an interesting than impacting series, because the whole atmosphere gets too surreal in most cases to relate to, although the characters are more or less realistic (though I’m afraid Popo became a bit too much of a retard for me), though I’m not too discerning of such things.

If you just need the lowdown on everything, I would give it around 8 or 9 out of 10. You can just take it as 8.5/10 lol. I’m in a good mood, and I really love the art and music. Although, definitely not as much in the same way as I love Wall-E animation or Zelda and Xenosaga and Chrono Trigger music or say, Mx0 plot. Kaiba is simply really unique and …different to me, but this may change as I get exposed to more series :\ oh the ironies of life..

I shall end off with a Moe. Except she has a buttcrack, which rates disturbing everytime I look at it. Even though it’s really not that obvious, and even though she’s always looking so innocent, you Chroniko you.

Well I hope that wasn’t too bad a read. I get really really rambly. All the time, too. Not good. Not good at all.