Tag Archives: anime

Mirai Nikki — First Impression

Impressions,

Mirai Nikki is one of my favorite manga. So I was eagerly anticipating the anime adaptation, and probably would have enjoyed it no matter what. But how did it turn out?

Pretty well. Yukiteru’s portrayal went great: he’s pathetic but can be pretty cool when push comes to shove. Yuno (who is really the star of the manga, at least for me) went less well though. Much of her charm comes from how two-faced she is. She can be sweet and innocent, or a crazy bitch. I felt that they neglected the sweet and innocent part, and jumped the gun on the crazy bitch part, making it less effective. Look at this face:

This is a sex-crazed Yuno that I don’t recall seeing until much later in the manga. It’s the contrasts that make Yuno such an effective character, and I’m concerned that the animators are neglecting that. They’re only focusing on the crazy part. But much of her appeal comes from how she lulls the reader and Yukiteru into a false sense of trust and security, only to leap to an even higher echelon of insanity.

I must say: excellent casting for the voice actors. Yukiteru, Yuki and Merumeru sound just like I imagined them. Deus sounds even better than I imagined him.

I’ll definitely be blogging this. It’s gonna be awesome. This whole season is looking great for lovers of crazy characters such as myself. We have the murderous Caster pair from Fate / zero, the entire cast of C^3 (the second episode was amazing, by the way, although I’m not going to blog it) and we also have Gasai Yuno, the crown princess of the crazies.

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Mobile Suit Gundam AGE — First Impression

Impressions,

As expected, this is a kid’s show, so it’s not your typical Gundam. This means that it’s straightforward and the plot is predictable. “The UE will never attack our colony!” “Yes they will!” Boom. The little kid being smarter than all the adults is kind of annoying as well.

But still, this kind of thing is nice once in a while. The animation is great, and the characters are adorable. Emily is too cute. Even the old engineer is cute.

Despite being a kid’s show, it manages to bring back the love for the older Gundams. I liked how the boy kicked around Haro like a soccer ball. And the Gundams are objects of legend in this timeline. In this way it’s a bit reminiscent of Turn A Gundam. Turn A also took the Gundam universe and created something new out of it, and ended up being my favorite show in the series. Hopefully Gundam AGE will follow in its footsteps, as Gundam for a younger audience.

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Baka to Test to Shoukanjuu Ni! Review — C-

Reviews,

The adventures of chibi fighters with powers derived from test scores return.

Ok, so the jokes are definitely starting to get old. How many Minami flat chest jokes have we heard at this point? How many times has Himeji cooked poison? How often has Shouko blackmailed Yuuji? (ok, I still enjoy that last one) The first season was enjoyable: they should have stopped while they were ahead.

There were a few good episodes, particularly the peeking in the bath arc, the Minami episodes and that one episode on Shouko. But then everything just gets reset.

I don’t have much else to say. The strongest part of the first season was in its fights and wacky humor (e.g., Shouko and Yuuji, Hideyoshi as a girl, and Akihisa getting the crap beaten out of him). In this season, we got much less of this than I would have liked. Instead, they decided to focus on beach episodes, festivals and Himeji’s cooking.

  • Plot / Script – C – Reuse of jokes.
  • Characters – C – I always liked the characters in this series (except Himeji). But this season didn’t add much to them.
  • Production – B – It has a unique visual style.
  • Overall – C-

Recommendations – School Rumble, Seto no Hanayome, Full Metal Panic Fumoffu

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Ben-to — First Impression

Impressions,

The supermarket has become a battleground. Every day, when leftover bento are reduced to half price, an epic battle takes place to determine who will save the most money.

This was dumb. But it was also pretty funny, in a ridiculous way.

The characters are nice and crazy. The male lead gets beaten half to death but keeps coming back for half price bento. Same with girl he meets in the store, who seems to enjoy watching people beat each other up over bento. Her stalker, the class president, is also entertaining (and violent). Finally we have the blue haired girl, who is not too talkative but seemingly dedicated to half price bento (and even more violent).

It was an introductory episode, though, so it’s hard to say how the rest of the series will turn out. I’m predicting it will become a harem and go downhill, but hopefully I’m wrong. I’m not sure how they’ll base an entire series on this premise, but it seems crazy enough that it just might work.

Just please don’t let this turn into a repeat of Onii-chan no Koto’s stocking fetish.

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Fate / Zero 02 — A Girl in the Snow

Fate / Zero,

This is the first show I’m picking up to blog this season. I love everything Type Moon and can’t resist.

This episode picked up the pace significantly from the first episode. We’re still introducing the characters, but they’ve begun with the action.

Wanker and the Orangutan

The servant is even more idiotic than the master. But at least he has some ambition. He doesn’t even care about the holy grail war, just wants to conquer the world. Such a straightforward hero isn’t bad once in a while. And he agrees with me that his master is pathetic.

But still, Alexander the great must be rolling over in his grave.

Bluebeard

Bluebeard and his partner, however, more than made up for Wanker and the Orangutan. We have a team of two serial killers! This should be fun. In Fate / Stay Night, we didn’t have any masters this downright evil. (Shinji’s murder spree was more pathetic than evil, as was Caster’s once her rationale was revealed.)

I liked the way they introduced these two characters. We already have this guy in a middle of a murder, and then this other guy who looks like a monster out of a horror book appears from a circle of blood. The serial killer tells him to eat the kid. Bluebeard approaches the child, bends down, unties his ropes, and tells him how to leave. Wait, maybe he isn’t so bad after all. He could be a character like Shinji’s Rider. Just a kindly old man.

“Sshhh, watch closely,” Bluebeard tells his master. The child looks towards the exit of the house filled with light, and hope lights up his face. Then he’s grabbed by some tentacles and swallowed whole. A great scene, the way it toys with your emotions.

Breaking and Entering

It’s not that surprising that Kirei betrayed Tohsaka, but his Assassin sure was defeated quickly. I doubt it’s dead yet though. The scene where he broke into the house was very well animated.

I’m curious how Kirei is going to get out of this. He must have a backup plan, since he’s got to stick around to the end to fight it out with Emiya. Maybe he’ll take Rin hostage or something.

The Einzberns

Ilya’s mother is pretty dull at the moment. Too passive. I hope she has some dark secret or something. At least we know she’s going to die.

And little Ilya is cute. I love the snow, we need more anime that includes snow. If they replaced every beach episode with a snow episode I would be a happy camper. Snow is so alluring. And it looks so beautiful.

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