Along with this realization, I think I solved a question I’ve been pondering for years now – namely how can one best differentiate between a kid and an adult. The answer is that a kid thinks time does not go fast enough and an adult thinks time goes too fast. I fall into the latter category; I’m appalled that I haven’t posted anything in slightly over 2 months but it certainly doesn’t feel like it’s been 2 months. Where does the time go???

For those that are interested in why it’s been so long since I last wrote something, I’ll get to later down the page. First, let’s do some anime blogging and we might as well start with my thoughts on the new shows that made up the Winter 2010 season.

Sora No Woto

Status – Finished
Final Score –  8/12 B+
In Short – A-1 deserves praise for attempting a show of the caliber but it really needed to be a 24 episode series. It wasn’t, though, and as a result the pacing is too hurky-jerky, the story-telling is too compressed, and the characters are too flat for the viewer to really enjoy Sora no Woto as much as it should have been. Which is a shame because the world that A-1 created was a really interesting one that truly begged to be investigated more.

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Chuu Bra!!

Status – Dropped after 4 episodes
Interim Score –  2/12 F
In Short – I knew I shouldn’t have bothered with this show but there was so few shows this season I figured what was the harm in watching a couple of episodes. Mistake, I could live with a merely poorly constructed fan-service show but I was not ready for this show. It was a poorly constructed fan-service show with a quasi-realistic portrayal of young teenage girls as they grapple with self-image issues. Each episode left me feeling unclean and wondering who exactly thought animating this show was a good idea. Thankfully, I could legitimately drop Chuu Bra after 4 episodes when it became apparent that the show, even without accounting for the creep factor, was a lousy show.

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Katanagatari

Status – Waiting for the next episode
Interim Score –  8/12 B+
In Short – The first 3 episodes of Katanagatari aired this season and while it started off very shaky – each subsequent episode has shown a marked improvement over the previous. I think the key to liking this show is to not create the wrong expectations. This is a NisiOisiN story so even though it’s about sword fighters and medieval Japan – the emphasis is on the characters and their conversations and not on the blood/ gore/ action scenes that one might assume a show like this would focus on.

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Seikon no Qwaser

Status – 12 episodes watched and still reluctantly watching
Interim Score –  3/12 D
In Short – For a show that tries to push the envelope in terms of fan-service, you’d think the animators could come up with something that wasn’t so boring. Scenes that should shock or titillate more-often-then-not leave me yawning, wishing that I could bean some sense into the manga/anime creators that think T&A is all that’s needed to carry a show. Sometimes I think they forget that the internet exists. The sole saving grace to Seikon no Qwaser is that one character is being voiced by Aya Hirano (aka Haruhi) and she’s absolutely awesome – truly one of her best efforts to date. It’s not enough to make this show a worthwhile watch to the vast majority of anime watchers but it is something.

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Omamori Himari

Status – Dropped after 7 episodes
Interim Score –  5/12 C+
In Short – I continue to be weak against anime shows that feature the supernatural/Japanese religious elements so when a show like Omamori Himari comes along with it’s generic blandness and it happens to have a supernatural element to it – I end up watching it longer then it deserves and having a higher opinion of it then it deserves. It wasn’t a horrible show and I’d probably have finished watching it except that I decided one day that I was sick of the all the not-really-horrible but not-really-good shows I was watching and dropped it along with a few others.

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Ladies versus Butlers!

Status – Finished
Final Score –  4/12 C
In Short – And yet somehow I finished this show,  though in my defense this show did have some potential and I found the opening song catchy. If they had skipped the harem of girls with one-dimensional personalities and focused on the triangle of the main guy and the two girls – drill hair and childhood friend it might even had been a good show but this is Xebec were talking about so that was just wishful thinking. This was probably the least painful fan-service show to watch of the season so if you absolutely needed your fix this was your bet.

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Durarara!!

Status – 13 episodes watched and impatient for more
Interim Score –  10.5/12 Strong A
In Short – One of the best new shows of the season. For those that wanted Durarara to be Baccano 2, this first half of the show was probably a big disappointment. The very minimal body count and focus on character/story development was just two ways Durarara felt unBaccano-like. I’ll admit that this desire clouded my feelings for a while but I eventually got over it when I realized that Durarara was going to be 24 episodes long and it had the time to develop it’s characters in ways that Baccano didn’t and because the animators started to reveal parts of the larger plot of Durarara and it became interesting in it’s own way. I totally psyched for the second half.

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Baka to Test to Shoukanjuu

Status – Dropped after 7 episodes
Interim Score –  6/12 B-
In Short – Another casualty along with Omamori Himari; I thought it started strong but it began to bog down in the middle and I wasn’t in the mood that day to put up with a show that could obviously being doing much better. Since then I’ve kinda felt bad about dropping it but I’ve yet to feel the urge to pick up where I left off so I guess it’s just best to let sleeping dogs lie.

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Dance In The Vampire Bund

Status – 9 episodes watched and a desire to finish
Interim Score –  6/12 B-
In Short – I really had high hopes for this and I thought the first episode was brilliant but my disappointment grew as I kept waiting for the show to settle down and start telling a story.  since I like the Shaft/Shinbou combo I didn’t want to give up on it so after the sixth episode I decided to put it aside till I had all the episodes and had the ability to watch them together. Some shows, I’ve realized, work better when marathoned and just the other day I watched episodes 7-9 together and I liked it more than I was expecting. I hope this bodes well for the rest of the series.

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Ookami Kakushi

Status – Dropped after 7 episodes
Interim Score –  6/12 B-
In Short – Another not-really-bad but not-really-good show that I decided to drop. In it’s favor was the fact that a competent animation studio was animating this and not Studio Deen who had done the previous Ryuukishi07 shows (Higurashi, Umineko no Naku Koro ni). This positive is negated by the larger problem of the source material recycling so much of the show’s content from those previous Ryuukishi07 shows. Also, I’ve gotten tired of how all these shows are placed 25+ years ago – I’m starting to think Ryuukishi either lacks the will to figure out how to do a mystery/horror series where the characters have access to cell phones, GPS devices, and the internet or lacks the intelligence to write a new story that doesn’t rip off his/her/its one other story idea.

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Hanamaru Youchien

Status – Finished and Wishing for Season 2
Final Score –  12/12 Perfect
In Short – Saved the best for last. I can still remember how utterly stupefied I was when it was announced that Gainax’s next series was going to be Hanamaru Youchien. This series had J.C. Staff written all over it, why was Gainax doing this? I checked the manga out and was decidedly underwhelmed after reading the first 10 chapters. With absolutely no confidence that Hanamaru Youchien was going to be good, imagine my surprise when Gainax cranked this out of the stadium. Who knew the studio known for it’s hot-blooded action series could do such a warm, relaxing, cute, funny series. I think Gainax just became my preferred studio to do the anime for Yotsuba if/when the creator ever allows one to get made. Gainax also deserves tons of praise for having a different ending song/animation for each episode; I loved all the different songs and subjects. (Now if only KyoAni could do the same thing with K-On.)

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I really should add one final show – Hidemari Sketch x ☆☆☆ (aka season 3) – since it aired this season as well but I’ve just seen the first couple of episodes and so I don’t have a firm opinion on it yet. After purging all the bad – mediocre shows of this season, I needed something to fill the space and decided it was time to catch myself up on this series and started with the first series. I plan on making a post about all the series I’ve been watching instead of the current crop of shows so look for my thoughts on this Shaft/Shinbou series soon.

And maybe I’ll even get around to doing my top shows of 2009 already and talking about the new spring 2010 shows as well. Now onto where I was for 2 months.

If it was just up to me, I’d probably just pretend nothing happened and keep blogging but I’m pretty sure there are at least a few people who were wondering what happened to me and so I’ll give a condensed version of the various reasons and we can go from there.

A normal February is a pretty depressing month already but this one was a bit harder to get through than most. The weather was truly atrocious; it wasn’t so much the almost unending amount of snow we got (about 45 inches) but the complete lack of sunlight we had. I checked online and for the entire month of February we had 7 hours of clear skies. It didn’t break down how much of those 7 hours occurred during daylight or at night but even in all 7 hours happened during daylight hours and I happened to be awake – it still essentially meant I went a month without seeing the sun.

Also weighing on my mind was that this February was the one year anniversary of my grandma passing. I’ll get myself wound up in anger if I think about it too much so I’ll just say that I consider my 3 aunts the reason why my grandma isn’t living today. Also, it’s very important for everyone to decide how much or how little medical care they want and get it in writing because you can’t rely on your family to have your best interests at heart – you could get admitted to the hospital for a serious but not life threatening reason and in the course of treatment your family could decide to remove your feeding tube and let you starve to death over the course of 3 weeks.

Factor in a really weak anime season and I just didn’t feel like talking about anime or do much of anything. March rolled around and almost like a switch the weather turned gorgeous. Temperatures shot up into the 60’s and 70’s and it was wall-to-wall sunny. I spent as much time as I could outside and the sight of the first flowers of the season  – crocuses – went a long way to improve my mood. I started to feel the urge to write again but I kept getting blocked.

I volunteered to be the Dungeon Master in a 6 part campaign for my sister, brother-in-law, and friends in Dungeons & Dragons. We were going to use a printed campaign but we were not satisfied with the quality of writing so I further volunteered to write one myself and it takes an amazingly large amount of time to create a halfway decent adventure. I also picked up a temporary job working for the census and it’s been leaving me really tuckered out when I get home at night. And of course to blog about anime I first need to watch anime. And I’ve also been slowly working on my top anime of 2009 posts because I’d like all the parts to be done or almost done when I start posting them. And once it got to be a long time between posts I felt reluctant to explain why it’s been a long time because I started a blog talk about anime and a little SF, not to be a personal blog.

As a result, even though I’ve been meaning to start writing again it’s been almost a month before I had the chance to sit down and write something I could publish. I guess at this point I should just listen to the wise words from Manabi Straight and say, “Forward, Go!!” and get back to blogging.

Filed under: anime, anime rants/views, meta/office keeping, series review

Pixiv Sauce I haven’t done one of these in a long time! I’m not cut out for reviewing stuff, I suck at them so I take the easy way out and just say a few sentences and get it over with. That will be the disclaimer, these reviews are not SUPAH in any way. The title [...]

Oh wow, Isuzu has been taken over by her lust for Hiroshi! There was also a nice action sequence with Nemuru and Isuzu. Isuzu has been practicing her DUAL BLADE wielding skillz! But she’s no match for Nemuru in GOD MODE, so it’s Isuzu’s lost. We all know wolf and the moon go together, but does it [...]

I’m still considering dropping this series, due to the annoying characters and mildly ridiculous plot that I seem to have no patience for. Don’t be surprised if this is my last post about the series; if I watch episode 6 and can’t even bring myself to blog about it, that’ll be that.

But holy crap, I did lol when Issei did an awesome imitation of a gecko. GOOD JOB, RYUKISHI07 (… or maybe that was AIC’s fault, lawl)
Also, SPOILERS AHEAD. As in, plot-altering spoilers that really sucked the fun out of the plot. Read at your own risk, of course.

Hiroshi’s still recovering from his run-in with the wolf chick, and Isuzu’s dealing with problems of her own: the local neighborhood watch is keeping a close eye on Issei after his transgressions. Her family begins to worry greatly about him, and he eventually escapes from their apartment.

Meanwhile, Hiroshi confronts Nemuru about her weird glances and discussion about him behind his back, but she brushes him off. In the library, he tells Kaname about what he saw the previous night, but she doesn’t take him seriously. They both wonder some about Isuzu’s abrupt absence from school, but don’t visit her.

Later that night, Hiroshi is taking out the trash when he is attacked by Issei. A chase ensues, and Hiroshi is almost done for when the chick who likes Issei shows up and distracts him long enough for Hiroshi to flee. The neighborhood watch shows up and takes the girl into custody, but Issei flees…

… only to be slaughtered by the wolf chick, who cries emo tears as she does the deed.

Wait, what? I thought Issei was the main point of conflict at this point? Taking him out of the equation certainly won’t help the series, since he was basically the most interesting (albeit extreme) character in it. (Nemuru’s been stripped of that title, since she has really done nothing but been creepy and quiet and one-dimensional since the first episode.)

Anyway, we get a brief glimpse of Nemuru reporting the murder to her father (grandfather?) before morning comes and everyone goes back to school. Isuzu, who still acts funny around Nemuru, eventually spills to Hiroshi that Issei was murdered. Cut to ending theme.

So the only thing that’s keeping me hooked for the next episode is the plot potential with Issei’s death. Are we finally going to find out more about this elusive wolf chick? Will Isuzu fall prey to someone/something next? And is Nemuru going to reveal her connection to the wolf chick?

Of course, none of that is going to matter if the characters keep being as one-note as they are. Luckily, Isuzu has stopped being so clingy and whiny, but chances are she’s going to start up again next week… and she’ll throw in some oniichan angst to go with it. All of that could, though, actually be interesting depending on Hiroshi’s reaction. My continuing of this series will all come down to character development and what the series makes of Issei’s death.

CJ’s Rating: 6.5 out of 10 California rolls

The Face of Love So it seems these wolf tendencies, or whatever it is, arises when the infected person is in heat, and it looks like it doesn’t matter what the gender their interest is. Issei was both attracted to a guy and a girl…maybe. >_> And I guess their time is during the Hassaku Harvest. [...]

The characters in this series piss me off like none other. Hiro’s spineless, Isuzu’s obnoxious, and holy crap is Isuzu’s older brother an uber- creeper. Like, if he were my neighbor, I’d buy at least twenty shotguns to keep in various places around the house. And the yaoi factor is kinda ridiculous; what’s the demographic supposed to be for this series? Fourteen-year-old yaoi fangirls?

That said, I might just stick with this series, partly because Nemuru’s awesome, partly because I actually sympathize with Isuzu’s plight a little bit. You meet this guy, he’s super nice, but you know he’s in danger for one reason or another… and you don’t want anything bad to happen to him. I get that much. But holy crapola, do you HAVE to run around trying to seduce the guy to “protect” him?!

For most of episodes 2 and 3, the aimless romance antics and other randomness are only occasionally countered with gloom and doom. There’s foreshadowing and creepy moments, yeah, but nothing actually worth watching. Those episodes were almost bad enough to make me drop the series altogether, especially because Isuzu’s SO FREAKING ANNOYING UGH.

But with Issei’s actions at the end of episode 3, things definitely take a turn for the nastier. Issei’s bizarre actions are creepy enough, and then you have the element of the broken Hissaku air freshener… Way to take the mystery up a level, Ryukishi07.

Things don’t get really good til episode 4, though, when it becomes clear that Isuzu does have some idea of what’s wrong with her brother. That scene indirectly added some much-needed depth to her character while keeping poor Hiro terrified, just like in any good horror series. (Although some would argue Keiichi wasn’t nearly this terrified for most of Higurashi No!! I said I would stop the comparisons!)

Even if episode 4 hadn’t been that good, I probably would’ve stuck around another episode or so for the music and eye candy. (And no, I don’t mean fanservice a la episode 3.) Not only is the animation fairly smooth, but the art is downright gorgeous at times. Character designs are well-done, and the action (as sparse as it is) is satisfyingly scary without being, say, Mnemosyne. Heck, if Isuzu weren’t so annoying, she’d be a Saimoe contender since she’s so cute. At this rate, Kana-chan, who’s far less obnoxious, will get farther than her.

I know I originally tweeted about dropping this show, but at this point, I might as well stick with it for a while longer. With Hiro’s horrifying experience at the end of episode 4 and the introduction of a new character, one has to wonder if the series’ pacing is going to finally pick up. If things get too convoluted or slow down too much, I’ll probably end up dropping, since almost all of the characters have failed to capture my fangirling. Nemuru’s the exception, but also I’ll drop if her screentime doesn’t increase. You’re on notice, Ookami Kakushi.

CJ’s Rating: 7 out of 10 California rolls
(it WOULD be a 6, but episode 4 was epic enough to save it from a failing grade.)

Alright~ Let’s begin the pseudo live blogging experiment!! As an added bonus, just to see how things go, I will try not to heavily edit the text written here. So expect to have some bad language along with this. But since it’s on my conscious now, I’ll be holding myself back…-_- The edits will only be [...]

I didn’t even have an idea of what was airing in the Winter 2010 season until most of the new shows already started airing, so I’m having to make decisions about what I want to watch based on less information and time thinking than I usually do.

From the Fall Season, Kimi ni Todoke, Fullmetal Alchemist, Kobato, Railgun, and Letter Bee are all continuing, so I’m looking for 3 to 4 shows to replace the shows that have finished up.  Here are some quick thoughts on some of the series airing in the fall.  I’ll skip anything that looks too kiddie or which is a sequel to something I haven’t seen:

Chu-Bra!!

A show about a middle school student starting an “underwear club” to spread the merits of wearing sexy underwear.  Um, double triple quadruple super duper duper hell no.

Sora no Woto

So basically, this looks like it’s like K-ON!, except worse, because they’re in the middle of a war.

Ladies vs Butlers!

I’m not even sure what to think about this series.  It definitely looks like a harem, and it’s along the “girls go wild over young-looking-boys” type.  I guess that’s better than the young-looking-girls shows. Maybe.

Omamori Himari

Another orphaned-boy-taken-in-by-neighbor-girls-parents story.  Except this time the magical girl who pops up is a cat girl. And the boy is allergic to cats.  This at least sounds mildly interesting.  At least far more interesting than any of the shows so far.

Baka to Test to Shoukanjuu

This kind of sounds like Special A, except in reverse.  I’m not sure about the summoning creatures part of this show though.

Dance in the Vampire Bund

I’m not really one for Vampire shows, but this show actually looks (visually) interesting, and it’s done by SHAFT, which definitely helps it.

Durarara!!

Basically sounds like gangs looking for a mythical head of a headless motorcycle rider.  Mmmm…not the worst show I’ve seen this season but I still think there are better things to watch.

Ookami Kakushi

This is a show based off of a game made by the people who did Higurashi.  I’ve never seen any of those series, but I’ve been curious about them.

Seikon no Qwaser

A show about people who can manipulate iron and who draw power from breast milk fighting each other.  That sounds like there is too much that can go bad here.

Hanamaru Kindergarten

This is by GAINAX which, of course, means this show won’t have a proper ending.

Katanagatari

An actually somewhat decent looking Edo-era sword fighting show.  I’ll have to see if it ultimately makes my cut or not, though.

So, My Watch List Is…

I wasn’t planning on picking up another series to blog this season unless there was just something that looked fantastic, and there isn’t, so I’ll only add shows to watch.  I think this time, I’ll only add 3 shows.  I felt like I was going to add either 3 or 5, and I didn’t want 5 new shows, so I went with my top 3, and they are:

Dance in the Vampire Bund
Omamori Himari
Ookami Kakushi