Anime Thread 2.0

[Kimiko]

Recently finished:
Venus Versus Virus - A very nice, but short magical girl/supernatural/action/comedy/drama anime. Oh, and don't forget the gothic lolita fashion. Venus Vanguard is after all a fashion store, at least on the outside. There isn't much to say about it really. It is short, but everything is explained well, and the story wouldn't have stretched that much longer without adding side stories and stretching out the action. There is a good mix of drama, comedy and action. There isn't much suspense, but the story never drags either.
I don't know who added the 'yuri' theme to the encyclopedia, but that just isn't true. Even if you really look very hard, Lucia's feelings for Sumire aren't more than friendship, and Sumire herself spends much of the anime in love with her boyfriend. The eyecatch/ED shots are suggestive of course, but that's to be expected these days.

Mai-Otome 0~S.ifr~ - Well, all three eps. have been released for a while now, so it was time to watch this again. I haven't watched Mai-Otome again though, so I was a little uncertain about the relationships. I'm sure there is more info to be found if I did that.
There is a lot of action of course. It's only a short OVA after all. Lots of fanservice too unfortunately, but I suppose it can't be helped. It was nice to see Miyu again, as well as to get some more hints at a connection between Mai-HiME and Mai-Otome. I'm not sure what to make of the Schwartz and Aswad. They don't get much screen time except as cannon fodder. The biggest mystery I think was the origin of Lena's 'unauthorized Robe' at the end, unless I'm missing something. Maybe there's a connection to the rumored new anime?

Jigoku Shoujo Mitsuganae (aka Hell Girl season 3) - Hmm, it's been a while since I watched the first two seasons. Who is who again, and how did they get where they are now? I'm not sure, but it seems that the art is a tiny bit sloppier than I recall.
Overall, this season isn't much different from the previous two. Many different stories, but all with common elements. Be sure to keep something uplifting handy for afterwards, because the end (Yuzuki's story) is very tragic.

Kamichu! - Cute and funny, just what I need at the moment. The first ep. reminded me of Ponyo. And then the second had elements similar to Spirited Away. I'd recommend this anime to fans of Miyazaki/Ghibli's fairytale movies.

Bamboo Blade - Mentioned in a SloL recommendation thread. So far it's okay. Funny at times, but more sports than slice-of-life.
The characters were deeper than I expected at first. I also liked that contrary to how it usually goes, the girls were the focus of the anime and the boys were only supporting characters. Overall, quite a nice anime.

Dominion Tank Police - Whoa, old-school hand-animated anime. I wonder why I put this on my to-watch list. Manga by Masamune Shirow? Female main character? Oh well, it's only 4 eps. long (plus 6 for the sequel).
The ending seems a little incomplete, but a deep story was never really the focus I suppose.
New Dominion Tank Police - It's only a few years younger than DTP, but the quality is much improved. Did I just see a prototype tachikoma?
The subtitles often don't exactly match the spoken Japanese. They're probably just a copy of the English dub

Kanon (2006) - Moe overload! Seriously, this is almost as much as Ichigo Mashimaro. I wonder what kind of plot, if any, there will be though.
I still don't like moe too much. I like cuteness a lot; a little clumsiness can be endearing too, but this over the top cuteness combined with exaggerated stupidity is just too much for me. It makes the characters unbelievable and annoying. Well, I'll give it a few more eps. Maybe it will get more interesting.
Well what do you know, it did get more interesting. With some supernatural mystery and all. Kanon's visual novel dating-sim roots show in the sometimes a little stilted dialogue and abrupt scene changes, but the plot makes up for that. There is a little more tragedy/sadness at times than I would prefer in my anime, but it's not overwhelming. This anime ended up being a lot better than I expected at first.

Currently watching:
Tower Of Druaga (both Aegis and Sword)

Lined up next:
Tsukihime, Paprika, Full Metal Panic: Fumoffu, and Witchblade (seems I got a dub-only copy though, so not sure if I'll watch that)

[Tekka]

Spice and Wolf season 2 = Happiness.

Been waiting for this for now I need more Nougami Neuro and Bamboo Blade.

[Quemaqua]

So I've been re-watching Love Hina, and it's actually quite a bit better than I remembered it being. I've been working out in the evenings again now that I'm in a condo that isn't built out of paper, so I've also been watching stuff while I do so. Given that I'm attempting to throw myself into learning Japanese again, I've been watching pretty much just anime. And I realized that a lot of the stuff I have is pretty dark. Like... maybe a little too dark, and maybe I need to pick up some stuff that's a little more lighthearted and fluffy. Love Hina reminded me that a good comedy can be good for the soul.

Anybody have any recommendations? I've seen 90% of Azumanga Diaoh, which I still need to actually go out and buy because it's amazingly awesome, but I don't really know what else to go for. I have a friend who was telling me to go watch Lucky Star, so I may try to find that at some point, but my knowledge of anime is apparently somewhat limited to the darker end of the spectrum. And these days, real life is depressing enough without trying to experience Berserk again. I love that anime to death, but I'm not sure my heart could take it.

[Kimiko]

What? You dare hang out on this forum without watching Lucky Star?
Just kidding
You really should watch it though. It's great.

[Quemaqua]

Heh, so I hear.

A little annoyed to see there isn't a complete box anywhere. I'm sick of buying individual DVDs for a billion dollars. That's one of the things that put me off watching anime a while back... got sick of paying for it. Rightstuf.com sells the discs for $22.49 apeice. At six discs, that's $134.94, not including tax and shipping. This show was what... 2006? 2007? Can't we do better than that by now?

[Kimiko]

The sixth DVD of Lucky Star only just came out a few months ago I think. The OVA is scheduled for next month or so. It'll be a while before the box set arrives I'm afraid. I'm waiting for that too.

[Quemaqua]

Yeah, I didn't realize that it was so recent. For some reason I was under the impression it had released a bit ago. Still... ugh, just start with a box set. Don't milk me this way. I'm too poor!

Ah well. At least AzuDia is really cheap.

EDIT - Okay, apparently Berserk got a remastered release. I've heard it isn't a true new film remaster and is just a better encode, but who knows if that's true or not. And either way, who cares? I saw some good comparisons, and the colors are brighter and the images a bit sharper, and it's progressive. Plus apparently there's been some work done to the subtitle translations, a subtitle re-sync, a dub re-sync, and adjusted volume balance (plus they fixed the Japanese mono track BS). So... wow. And for under thirty bucks. I had no idea, and I'm really excited to nab it. I guess I'll be watching something dark soon after all...

Oh well. At least I picked up AzuDia to counter-balance.

[Kimiko]

Recently finished:
Tower Of Druaga: The Aegis Of Uruk - Eh? Is this meant to be an adventure anime, or just silly comedy? I'm almost half way through and it still hasn't decided. The adventure aspect isn't great so far, and the comedy is worse.
Well, toward the end the adventure theme won out, but it never became great. The ending is just a big hook for the sequel.
Tower Of Druaga: The Sword Of Uruk - Uhm, did the art quality just plummet? The bad comedy is mostly gone, but the fantasy adventure still isn't all that great. Most of the characters are more interesting than the hero Jil. Also, all the women are support characters and wear sculpted armor and high heels. Bleh, there are too many bad points to list them all. Now that it's out of the way let's move on to something better.

Full Metal Panic: Fumoffu - I bought the Heavy Metal edition of Full Metal Panic, which includes this series, so I figured I should watch this too. If you expect nothing more than 12 eps. of silliness it isn't bad really.
The resolution seems rather low though (and 4:3 too) for anime made in 2003. Maybe it's because they had to fit everything on just two DVDs? Or am I expecting too much because I just watched something else in 1280×720?

Paprika - High quality art/animation. It shows some American influences I think, mainly in the character designs and Disney-esque dream sequences. The OP/ED theme is very nice.
Hmm, the story didn't really make that much sense though. It seemed to be mostly a vehicle for the director to show off the animation and do cool/weird dream stuff. Overall, I'd say it is worth seeing once or so.

Tsukihime - The first episode doesn't tell me much really. Oh wait, it's supposed to be a mystery. Well, that worked very well then.
An interesting vampire story, but it was at the same time rather short and slow-moving. The ending was also kinda unsatisfying.

Next:
Kannagi (considering the trouble I've had finding some licensed anime, I figured I'd better download it now before it disappears off the net), Iriya No Sora, UFO No Natsu, Code-E, Witchblade (I didn't like the dub-only copy I got, but fortunately I found another one), Okusama Wa Mahou Shoujo

[Tsurayu]

Hm, let's what I've been doing since last post.

Well, I decided to watch all of Shinkai Makomoto's works (5 Centimeters per Second, Voices of a Distant Star, The Place Promised in Our Early Days, etc..) Loved them all, but 5 Centimeters per Second and Voices of a Distant Star stood out to me more than the others. Also watched Kimi ga Nozomu Eien, which was a pretty good romance drama.

I also picked up some current running seasons. I'm continuing to watch Umineko no Naku Koro ni (I just wish SEACATS were faster with their subs.) I also picked up Princess Lover, but Hitode is also pretty slow about subbing, but unlike Umineko no Naku Koro ni, Hitode is the only competent fansubbers working on Princess Lover. I also decided to watch the Aria series. I have been meaning to get around to it for a long time, but always either forgot about it or wanted to watch something else before it. Shame too, I'm really enjoying it (on Aria the Natural now) and I'm sad I didn't watch it all sooner. I also watched Toki wo Kakeru Shoujo since it comes so universally recommended, but I didn't care for it all that much. I mean it was still pretty good, but it doesn't hold a candle to any of Shinkai Makamoto's works.

I also decided to read manga again. I started once several years ago, but gave up on it quickly. I've already caught up on Kodomo no Jikan and My Balls, and I've finished reading Bitter Virgin. Right now I'm reading Suzuka, and thinking of picking up KissxSis too; if you can't guess from the titles I prefer reading much more taboo, ecchi manga than I do with anime. XD

Umm, I think that is about it it.

Edit: Fixed a multitude of typos.

[Kimiko]

Aria is great, isn't it?

I liked Voices Of A Distant Star, but found it a little too short to tell much of a story. The Girl Who Leapt Through Time was better in that regard. How were the other Shinkai movies? I don't remember the synopses I read very well, but I think they were rather melancholy?

[Tsurayu]

Yeah, they all pretty much tell the same tale, but with different events and slightly different outcomes, but they all are pretty much romance dramas through-and-through. 5 Centimeters per Second is usually the most popular work followed by The Place Promised in our Early Days, then Voices of a Distant Star, and She and Her Cat. I haven't gotten around to seeing She and Her Cat yet, but I probably will eventually.

[Quemaqua]

I remember Voices of a Distant Star from way back in the day. As I recall, did the guy do basically the entire thing himself? I was pretty impressed. Haven't watched it in years now, but I remember it being pretty moving and quite surprising.

On top of picking up AzuDia and the remastered Berserk, I also grabbed Negima, Aria, and Gungrave. So much cheap anime these days. What the hell happened? Did they finally realize that there's so much of it over here it needs to get cheaper? I didn't pay over $40 for a single one of those boxes, and 4 of them were about $30 or a little under. Freaking epic. Negima was probably the goofiest buy, as I have no idea if I'll even like it and some of the reviews I've read have been a bit dismal, but it was so cheap I figured what the hell. I wanted to see what Akamatsu Ken got up to after Love Hina, and the manga seemed a little too fanservicey (I know, coming from a Love Hina fan... shut up).

I'm also in the process of picking up volumes 1-32 of the Berserk manga in Japanese. They're available in English and all, but not only am I trying to get myself stuff to encourage and assist my Japanese studies, I realized how much it was going to cost to buy 33 volumes at $8-$10 a pop. A much-cheaper batch of used Japanese books as a set seemed a lot more appealing suddenly. Will likely be a good long while before I can read them since I still haven't even fully grasped Japanese grammar, or even the entirety of hiragana, let alone katakana, and haven't even begun kanji yet. But it'll be nice to know it's waiting for me.

[Kimiko]

Recently finished:
Kannagi - Starts off as an interesting mix of supernatural, magical girl, and slice-of-life comedy genres, but mostly abandons the former aspects later on. There is a lot of fanservice and some of the comedy is a bit adolescent. Is it me or does the art/animation quality get worse over the course of the series? Some questions raised by the first few episodes (the 'impurities', Hakua, idolhood for survival) are never answered. Overall it appears as if both the budget ran out and the anime overtook the manga or something. Maybe a sequel will be made some day that finishes the story.

Okusama Wa Mahou Shoujo - Argh, what's with all the fanservice lately? Ureshiko acts so coquettish even oversexed teenagers would find it too much. Pity really, because the premise of this anime, an adult magical girl who doesn't want to give up her 'job', is an interesting and refreshing take on the genre.
Hmm, this is certainly a complicated dilemma that Ureshiko faces. Choose her job and she loses out on love, choose love and she has to give up her job. Either way she will have a part of her life curtailed. A forced choice that of course would never happen to a man. I really hope this anime will end differently, but fear that won't happen.
Well, the fanservice at least got a lot less after the beginning fortunately. The conclusion however ended up framing Ureshiko's dilemma as passing on the 'job' (ring) to her successor. In itself it is not a bad thing to tell a story about elders making way for a new generation. It is however a bad thing to portray a woman as 'retiring' from playing an active role in the world upon getting engaged to a man (who btw continues his career the same as ever).
I liked how this anime took a different point of view on an established genre. I didn't like how it started off with so much fanservice though. Most of all I didn't like how it reinforces stifling gender roles.

Witchblade - A woman who lost her memory and possesses a mysterious superpower and her precocious daughter against the big bad world. Interesting premise.
Well, there is indeed a lot of fanservice, but at least it isn't of the juvenile groping and pantyshots kind.
Aside from that, this anime has amazing depth. From the synopsis/trailer/promo art I was expecting lots of darkness and action (and fanservice). The action is definitely there, but it never gets really sinister. Instead there is a whole lot of sweet (and bittersweet) character development and drama, mixed with some light-hearted fun now and then. I would highly recommend this anime to fans of action like Speed Grapher and Claymore, as well as fans of deeper stories.

Superflat Monogram - Came across this while I was looking up some movie directors in the ANN encyclopedia. It's only five minutes long, so I decided to check it out.
Ah, so that's what they mean by 'superflat' style. It looks a bit too artsy to be of much use in general anime, but I can see some connection to The Girl Who Leapt Through Time's art.
This short movie is really more of an ad/music video. Not bad, but not really amazing or special either.
(Note: This video is also available on YouTube, but the quality is rather bad, even the 'HQ' version.)

Iriya No Sora, UFO No Natsu - Funny and mysterious, with ufos. Or at least someone suspected to be connected to ufo-y stuff.
After that, it gets weirder and weirder, then depressing, and the ending is mostly sad. Everything is explained in an epilogue, but that doesn't really help much. This anime will probably be interesting for fans of SaiKano (and OVA), as it has some similar themes.

Code-E - Heh. The beginning of the first ep. was quite effective. After seeing the '2017' date, I wondered why there were still an old rotary phone and CRT TV. Turns out there's a good reason for that.
Aw, Code-E was only the first half of the series. And Mission-E hasn't finished subbing yet :( This is a nice anime though. The ending was decent, although there is much unresolved of course.

Next:
Haibane Renmei, Shigofumi, Key The Metal Idol, Sketchbook, Grenadier

[Quemaqua]

I Haibane Renmei.

Okay, so I just watched the first disc of Aria. OH MY GOD. IT'S LIKE THEY PUT HAPPINESS ON A DVD. Quite possibly the most disgustingly cute thing I have ever seen, and yet it somehow manages to be consistently appealing and never nauseating. I'm shocked. Apparently I have to buy the other 2 seasons now.

[Kimiko]

Hihi Yes, Aria is wonderful for getting rid of bad moods.