I wanted this to be a single post but when I finished, a quick word count showed roughly 3000 words which is just too much to ask people to read in one sitting and also, who wants to scroll through such a long post? So a hasty cut was in order and here we are.

Let’s pick up where the last post left off with number 11 …

(11) – Aquarion Evol

Rating for episodes 1 to 7 – 9/12  A-

Even more fun then Symphogear has been this anime, Aquarion Evol – a sequel set 12,000 years after the original series. Normally, I don’t try to jump into a series but I figured 12,000 years was long enough to reset the series. The story is moderately interesting at this point; I’m most curious about the reason why two different dimensions are linked together and what these two dimensions mean to each other. What pushes Aquarion Evol this high is an interesting cast of characters, the high production values, and occasionally its dialogue. The noteworthy dialogue might be more of a function of the translation but I loved two lines in particular. The first was, ‘You stink deliciously,” which was what one of the antagonists said to the main female character; this has to be one of the oddest pick-up lines ever. The other is, ‘He’ll fly for anyone,’ said by a couple of female characters about the male main character’s habit of floating when being excited by a female character.

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(10) – Last Exile – Ginkyou no Fam

Rating for episodes 1 to 16 – 9/12  A-

Gonzo has done a much better job with this sequel then I thought possible but, by being that good, this sequel of Last Exile is frustrating when it fumbles along when it clearly should be soaring. The world building is stellar; the politics is intriguing; the story is grand enough to showcase the world building and politics; and, the characters are a great mix of people who fit with the story and allow the story to accomplish what it wants to do. Yet, when examined closely, problems crop up with Last Exile 2. Probably the most disappointing is the vocal performance of two of the main characters – Aki Toyosaki and Aoi Yuuki. Both are personal favorites and have many great roles under their belts but here they are so lackluster. I don’t know if it’s that the characters are poor or if it’s the fault of the person in charge of the vocal recording for these lackluster performances but the result really saps the energy out of the show when either are on-screen. Many of the other problems with Last Exile 2 could be fixed if the person(s) behind the series composition and the individual episode scripts had been fired and more competent writers brought in.

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(9) – Hunter x Hunter

Rating for episodes 1 to 19 – 9/12  A-

I fall into the category of people who have not seen the original Hunter x Hunter anime series nor read the source manga it’s based on which leaves me in a different state of mind over Hunter x Hunter then the majority of the people I have read talking about the strengths and weaknesses of this anime. For example, at the beginning when I thought the pacing in the episodes was dragging the series out I was constantly reading people who complained about how quickly they were flying through the source material. To me, Hunter x Hunter has really started to hit it’s stride during the current winter season and, as a result, is slowly bubbling towards the top of it’s anime brethren. A good shounen series is a nice change of pace sometimes.

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(8) – Tantei Opera Milky Holmes 2

Rating for episodes 1 to 4 – 9/12  A-

The first season of Milky Holmes was a hilarious, subversive gem that flew under too many people’s radars. For a successful sequel, Milky Holmes needed to use everything good about the first season and infuse that with fresh, new awesomeness. I didn’t know if the creators had it in them but the first four episodes have shown that somewhere in the dark, twisted depths of their psyches they were able to summon new reserves of insanity to make Milky Holmes 2 even better.

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(7) – Another

Rating for episodes 1 to 6 – 10/12  A

I’m going to resist the urge to make a joke using this anime’s name – Another. It pains me to pass this over because I like jokes like that but we don’t need yet another blogger making the same joke. With Hanasaku Iroha, P.A. Works finally succeeded at producing a great anime series after a string of disappointing attempts. At the onset I was anxious to see if Another would continue in the footsteps of Hanasaku Iroha or would it fall back to being another frustratingly almost good series like their early works. Six episodes in and I’m relieved that, after a bit of stumble in the first couple episodes from trying to force the creepy/scary vibe, it’s found a pace that should end with Another being one of the best anime of the season.

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(6) – Mouretsu Pirates

Rating for episodes 1 to 6 – 10.5/12  Strong A

It is indeed time for some piracy. Bodacious Pirates is about a high school girl who finds out her absent father was a space privateer (legal pirate) and with his death she’s inherited his ship and his title, if she desires them. She does, of course, because it wouldn’t be a show if she declined but it does take a couple of episodes for her to reach that decision. This made the show feel like it started off slowly but by episode 5 it started showing it’s potential and, egads, does this anime have potential. What it does with this potential remains to be seen but this anime has become the anime that I most look forward too each week.

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(5) – Ano Natsu de Matteru

Rating for episodes 1 to 6 – 11/12  A+

Over the last several years, J.C. Staff almost always has done its best work when Tatsuyuki Nagai is the director (Honey and Clover 2, Railgun, Toradora). Last year when he directed AnoHana for A-1 Pictures I wondered if he had left J.C. Staff for good and what that would mean for J.C. Staff’s future but with AnoNatsu I can stop worrying about J.C. Staff. at least partly. On paper, even though AnoNatsu is an original anime production, it doesn’t appear to be that ambitious of a project – as opposed to other recent anime originals like Penguindrum or Madoka – however, what it lacks in ambition has been more than made up with impeccable execution. J.C. Staff is in the odd position this season of fielding two of the top series of this season.

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(4) – Danshi Koukousei no Nichijou

Rating for episodes 1 to 6 – 11/12  A+

Extremely hilarious somehow still low-balls the comedic genius of Daily Lives of High School Boys. There are so many parts to this anime that are worthy of praise. There’s the comedy – it’s actually funny and there’s the characters – they capture high school boys and girls so realistically and the voice acting – they make the characters pop and then there’s the parts were NichiBros lightly lambastes common anime tropes to name but a few areas.

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(3) – Nisemonogatari

Rating for episodes 1 to 6 – 11.5/12  Near Perfect

Watching Nisemonogatari provides a yard stick to measure how much Shaft/Shinbou has improved in the last 2.5 years since Bakemonogatari and it’s almost scary to see the level of improvement that they’ve accomplished. Everything from the scripting to the visuals have been fine-tuned to be tighter, sharper, and better able to deliver the goods with less effort exerted. The only question left at this point is will Nisemonogatari outsell Bakemonogatari or not?

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(2) – Chihayafuru

Rating for episodes 1 to 19 – 12/12  Perfect

Residual respect for the animators, Madhouse, and my new-found respect for the voice actor Mamoru Miyano lead me to try Chihayafuru which is about a group of teens that play Karuta – a game where players compete over collecting cards featuring verses from 100 different poems. I’m glad I did because Chihayafuru started off excellently and has steadily gotten even better. Normally, I’m not a fan of “sports” anime but I love the characters and how they’ve grown over the course of the series and the creators have somehow even made a game like Karuta interesting to watch. The only potential fly-in-the-ointment is that the source material is a continuing manga and the animators have to give the anime some sense of conclusion while leaving the door open for a second season (fingers crossed for that).

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(1) – Natsume Yuujinchou Shi

Rating for episodes 1 to 6 – 12/12  Perfect

How does this series continue to find the room to get better? The creators should have already hit the asymptote of possible quality by the fourth season but they continue to push ever upwards. At this point, future seasons are probably a given and, though, I’m tempted to want countless more, I’ve started wanting to see an ending. I’ve even been thinking about how I’d love to see it end – an adult Natsume, happily married, sitting on the edge of one those short open porches that Japanese houses have and explaining to his young son/daughter not be afraid of the strange creatures he/she has started noticing and he then pulls out the now empty Book of Friends and starts into the story of his grandmother, Reiko, and the camera would pan up over a lovely bucolic scene, we’d hear Nyanko-sensei call out for some food item and the screen would fade out.

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I couldn’t have been the only one that felt having someone other Kyoto Animation doing a Key work was vaguely wrong; like some sort of cosmic law had been broken. Silly, I know but I still made sure I coached myself to remember to not fault P.A. Works for simply not being Kyoto Animation. (And by having P.A. Works do Angel Beats it probably cleared KyoAni’s schedule so they could do the Haruhi movie. Which I hear is great but will wait for a proper release before watching it.)

Rating for episodes 1 to 5 – 10/12  A
Anticipation Level: 3.5/5 – Medium

The Story

Otonashi wakes up in a strange world of a sprawling high school campus, apparently dead, though he does not remember his previous life. He meets Yuri, the head of a rebel organization that seeks to find the answers behind this world and why they are there from God’s representative in this world – Angel (who acts as the school’s student council president). He initially doesn’t believe he’s dead but after suffering fatal injuries twice, he decides to accept Yuri’s offer and joins her group as the seek to find answers and do battle against the seemingly invincible Angel.

The Fine Print

I’ll hardily be original, at this point, if I point out the apparent similarities to Haibane Renmei or the Melancholy of Haruhi or other Key works. Many people have been covering this show already and even in my limited reading all these similarities have been brought up and I have to agree that I do see these similarities but I’m not sure if this is the most productive way of talking about this show.

If I had jumped early and written this impression post after the first or second episode I would have complained that Angel Beats felt completely derivative of other works but I didn’t and I’m glad. Five episodes in and I’ve come to conclusion that the most accurate way to relate Angel Beats to these other works is to compare Angel Beats to a Quentin Tarantino film such as Kill Bill. It’s possible to pick out the influences that Tarantino had bouncing around in his mind while he created Kill Bill but the film is just too creative and good to cheapen it by saying he just ripped off those earlier works.

I also think there’s another reason why Angel Beats is reminding people of Haruhi and K-On! and it doesn’t have anything to do with source material. I think P.A. Works not only sees Angel Beats as the vehicle that will catapult them into the top-tier of animation studios like Haruhi did to KyoAni but it’s also the golden opportunity for the very young P.A. Works to gain a great deal of respect by outdoing KyoAni at their own game. There’s nothing with this because anytime an animation studio succeeds at pushing the bar higher, it prods the other animation studios to improve their game or go out of business.

And so far, I’ve been pretty impressed with the effort by P.A. Works – easily the best work they’ve done to this point – they might just be ready for the big leagues but I don’t think they quite unseat KyoAni yet.

Going into the show I was most worried about how well P.A. Works would handle the characterization. In their previous two works, True Tears and Canaan, I was disappointed by their inability to really make the characters come alive and the resulting disconnect this caused made it hard to really get into the show and care what happened. For Angel Beats, P.A. Works was working with the master of characterization, Jun Maeda (AIR, Kanon, Clannad) so it should be impossible to screw it up but if watching anime has taught me anything shows that should be impossible to screw up are just as likely to fail as other shows. Therefore, P.A. Works deserves the full credit for creating an interesting bunch of characters. If I was looking to pick a fight I’d congratulate them for doing a better job in a couple of episodes to convince me that Iwasawa was a real musician then KyoAni has been with convince me any of the girls in K-On are real musicians with 16+ episodes. But I’m not looking to pick a fight .

The other slight worry I had for Angel Beats was it’s story; specifically, how well would Jun Maeda do when he wasn’t writing the story for a visual novel. In this department I’ve been very happy as well. Every episode unravels a little more of the story and it appears to be deliciously more complex then it did at first look. I don’t want to spoil the story here so the only other thing I’ll say about the story is that for those that have grown to like the sad stories that characters in Key works often have, you won’t be disappointed here.

There is one area that when I compare Clannad to Angel Beats in broad generalities I notice that Angel Beats comes up short to Clannad. That area is how well the comedy is handled in Angel Beats and how easily the show shifts from comedy to drama and back to comedy. Some of the comedy feels tacked on with Angel Beats so far and sometimes the comedy fills ill-timed and a few of the jokes in Angel Beats really feel lifted from other Key works. It’s hardily a big problem and I wonder if I noticed it because I so liked Clannad; also, not to slight Angel Beats but I do find the comedy is heavily weighted to the “hits” side with very few “misses”.

In conclusion, Angel Beats follows in the footsteps of the past Key works and at the same time it offers something different than it’s anime predecessors. I was worried that P.A. Works didn’t have the capability to pull this off but they’ve been doing a great job. I’ve already mentioned the characters and the story but I can’t finish without mentioning the very high quality animation and great voice work as well. In a season stuffed with quality titles, Angel Beats has been able to find a place as one of this season’s must watch shows.

Possible spoilers so I’m sticking it here. At the end of episodes 2-5 the cast picture at the end of show changes depending on what’s happened in the episode and I figured I’d put them here.

Episode 2

Episode 3

Episode 4

Episode 5 - note the difference in Hinata's shadow