Steins; Gate 11 — Sending Memories through Time

Steins; Gate,

It reminds me of my favorite xkcd, only Kyouma’s time machine sends things in the opposite direction.

Christina discovers how to send memories through time, and apparently it’s simple enough that they can do it with supplies from Akiba. Part-time girl accuses Christina of being a CERN agent. The threats against Kyouma were upped again this week, although I found last week’s picture much more intimidating. Oh, and Kyouma has control of the LHC. The world is doomed.

The biggest question now, for me at least, is what is the story with part-time girl and Christina? I highly doubt that Christina is actually an agent of CERN. But since part-time girl is from the future, perhaps Christina eventually becomes an agent of CERN in some parallel universe. If you’ll recall, Christina was killed in the first episode but then came back with a timeline shift. I’m guessing that there is some organization in the future opposing CERN (including part-time girl and possibly Moeka, assuming they aren’t in CERN themselves, but not Kyouma, since he would have kept his memory…? or perhaps not, his memories seem to always go sideways in time, but never backwards).

Someone from the future probably arranged to have Christina killed, but then another change in timelines prevented this. Or maybe Mayushi changed the timeline— I have my suspicion that the microwave isn’t the only factor in allowing time travel, and that there’s more to Mayushi than meets the eye. Anyway, whatever happened, one of the effects may have been that Christina met Okarin and didn’t join CERN. Perhaps even part-time girl’s return to the past was the cause. I have my suspicions that Christina’s father will turn out to be with CERN, so this could help to explain how Christina joined.

If you actually managed to read through everything I just said, you can tell that my thoughts are even more confused than the Steins; Gate timeline. Which is exactly how a time travel show should be.

My one gripe with this episode is that its portrayal of science is stretching my suspension of disbelief. Chrstina was a genius physicist since elementary school? No, I’m sorry, but it doesn’t work that way. The myth of the child genius never actually happens. And the “Oh, I forgot, but I wrote a paper about the exact problem we’re trying to solve” never happens either. Same with “I can build a machine to connect to your brain and send memories through time with parts found next door by tomorrow”. I know, I know, it’s more entertaining this way, but this kind of portrayal of science in fiction sets ridiculous expectations among non-scientists. Same with its portrayal of hacking. “CERN hacked into our system, so now we have control of the LHC.” No, it doesn’t work that way. And anyone who was even aware that the LHC control system was on an outward facing network ought to be shot.

Softenni: Alternative Uses for Trophies

Discussion,

As someone who recently packed / disposed of my childhood trophy collection, I cracked up at this:

I guess I shouldn’t have thrown half of them out after all.

Softenni is Xebec’s seasonal excuse for drawing panty shots, but it’s still been surprisingly enjoyable so far. The fanservice is toned down compared to their other recent exercises in the same vein, and the humor is spot on.

This season’s been marked by a pretty decent crop of fanservice shows, as far as these things go: I’m enjoying Softenni, Dog Days, 30-Sai, Hen Zemi and Oretachi ni Tsubasa wa Nai. That’s four or five more than I usually like. The first four I appreciate mainly because of the humor (which the fanservice complements well). Oretachi came as the biggest surprise for me, as I decided to drop it after the first episode, watched the second a month or two later and was hooked. It takes a unique twist on your usual harem, which makes “one” guy having multiple girlfriends somewhat plausible. Oretachi also has a great sense of energy and a tight script.

We still have the usual mix of mediocre fanservice shows (Aria, Astarotte, and A Channel: I’m looking at you), the extraordinarily mediocre (Hoshizora) and the beyond terrible (Qwaser). I can’t help but wonder if this season might be the beginning of a trend for the better, but the cynic in me says it’s just an outlier. Let’s hope for more Oretachis and less Hoshizoras in the future.

Hanasaku Iroha 11 — ぼんぼりましょう! (Let’s Fest it Up!)

Hanasaku Iroha,

Now that Ohana is settled in and the supporting cast has been fleshed out, we’re going back to the more intensive drama of the earlier episodes. And the drama is just as good as it was before. This episode was jam-packed with new developments: the inn gets a bad review, it turns out Ohana’s mother wrote the review (not to mention she moved back home without even telling her daughter!), and Ohana meets up with Ko and meets her new rival.

All of the buildup from Ohana’s time at Kissuisou is really paying off now. This episode was an inversion of the earlier episodes: before, Ohana felt at home in Tokyo and lonely and unwelcome at Kissuiso. Now, everything about Tokyo makes her miserable, and she goes running to Minchi’s bosom for comfort.

Ohana’s mother has some serious issues. I can definitely see why she and the grandmother don’t get along. If I were the grandmother I would have kicked Ohana’s mother out of the house too. The grandmother’s only mistake was that she should have taken it a step further and gotten custody of her granddaughter 15 years earlier.

As for the love triangle with Ohana and Ko: this other girl was just what was needed to push things along, even if she doesn’t stand a chance (although hopefully she will continue to put up a good fight). She’s already managed to make Ohana jealous, now we just have to wait until she figures out why. Ohana is pretty dense, but hopefully it won’t take the entire remainder of the show for her to figure this out.

Now all that Hanasaku Iroha needs is some more Yuina screen time.

Kore wa Zombie Desu Ka? 13 (OVA) — Ayumu is Disgusting

Kore wa Zombie Desu Ka,

This was the episode that wasn’t going to air on TV, so they stuffed it full of the most perverted parts. The subjects of the fanservice were split between Ayumu and his harem about 50/50. The fanservice was a bit much for me, but the episode still had its moments.

They used a lot of the time in this episode to look at two of the side characters, Orito and Taeko. Orito is the usual perverted sidekick, so his segment didn’t add much, but Taeko’s segment (particularly the end) was quite well done. I’m almost rooting for the Taeko ending now. Especially since Eu’s voice was a letdown this episode, and her notes seemed kind of out of character.

Ayumu’s harem also expands by two this episode, with the addition of both Taeko and Sarasvati. I think that Sarasvati is going to expand his misfortunes even more than Sera has, however. The picture below says it all.

A second season has been announced, so we can all look forward to seeing more of how disgusting Ayumu is. As far as I can figure out, a date hasn’t been set yet for the next season.

Read or Die OVA Review — A-

Reviews,

My first exposure to the Read or Die series was through Read or Die TV. Read or Die TV was decidedly average in every way (except in the quantity of lesbianism), so I had low expectations for the OVA. But I ended up being pleasantly surprised.

First of all, the action sequences are fantastic. There’s a creative variety of powers, and just the way Yomiko uses paper is interesting in and of itself (see the paper airplane above). You wouldn’t expect this from a series about books where the main character, Yomiko, is a clumsy airhead and bookworm. It’s partially her clumsiness which makes the fight scenes so gripping— she has no trouble fighting off giant robots with scraps of paper, but it looks like she’s going to trip and fall over at any moment. For example, in the above scene with the paper airplane, Yomiko made short work of constructing the enormous airplane, but just forgot to attach the tail fin, with nearly fatal results. The creators managed to make a very convincing portrayal of Yomiko as someone who’s both extremely capable and extremely clumsy.

Another strong point of the OVA is its setting, where agents of the British library with special powers fight for books. The agents travel from city to city in search of these books, so parts of the show take place in England, Hong Kong, India, America, and the middle of the ocean. There’s quite the variety here.

If I had to point out a flaw, the villains are much less fleshed out than the protagonists. They’re clones of famous people from history, and most of their motivations aren’t entirely clear. As another nitpick, a running gag is that the president of the US pisses his pants whenever he shows up. I personally just found this kind of dumb and not particularly funny. It’s certainly not on the level of a Legend of Koizumi presidential portrayal.

Still, the good points greatly outweigh the bad, and I highly recommend the Read or Die OVA, especially if you’re looking for some good action.

  • Plot / Script – 9 / 10 – The British library goes to war, we have giant underwater steampunk rockets, and the final boss is Ludwig van Beethoven. What more needs to be said?
  • Characters – 9 / 10 – Examines Yomiko and Nancy in depth. Other characters, particularly the villains, are less well developed since time is limited.
  • Production – 9  / 10 – Fluid animation, especially in fight scenes.
  • Overall – A-

Recommendations – Darker than Black, Book of Bantorra, Read or Die TV (although it isn’t as good as the OVA)