Category: Reviews

Now that just about all of the 11 or 12-episode summer TV anime series have ended, it’s time to look back and draw some conclusions about what was worth watching.

Fumi (Aoi Hana)

Aoi Hana didn’t stand out at first, but as I continued to follow it, I grew to like it more and more. The subject, girl-girl love among schoolgirls, is one that some will find intriguing…  The characters all seemed as if drawn from life, and  were never made to act out of character, as the story unfolded in a natural unforced way. In contrast to many other romance anime, there was no attempt to exaggerate or to contrive humorous situations.   While the lead character wasn’t particularly good-looking, many viewers found her – or her facial expressions – very cute.  I found that her habit, when alone in her room, of  throwing herself down to lie contemplating the day’s events, was rather charming. Partway through the series Fumi drops one relationship and continues with another.  In the anime, the viewer has to infer how far these relationships went, or might go, but if you read the original manga far enough, it does eventually spell it out more explicitly.  The anime artwork is done in a beautiful pastel style, that suits the story well.

Tokyo Magnitude 8 does not disappoint, unless you wanted 11 episodes of structural catastrophe! In fact, this is a disaster as experienced by a young girl, Mirai, and her younger brother Yuuki.  There’s less emphasis on large-scale destruction after the first episode, and more on the experiences of the characters as they trek for kilometers through the wrecked city to reach  homes and families that may no longer exist. Towards the end, there’s a wrenching shift of perspective, that will probably send you back to re-watch several episodes.

Spice and Wolf II ended being a disappointment, as it started off promisingly, but never attained the excitement and magic of the first series, instead losing itself in drawn-out business schemes, and tiresome and none too convincing squabbling between Lawrence and Horo.  Too often, Lawrence behaves like a schoolboy rather than an experienced traveller and trader. It has an open-ended last episode, so we may get further series until everybody agrees they can’t bear it any longer.

Bakemonogatari is fantastic, with magical curses, gorgeous sexy girls, wicked humour, and an art style that some will love and some  may find annoyingly arty.  I’ll definitely buy this if it is issued as a reasonably priced subtitled box-set.

Cross Game (51 eps) is still running, and continues to charm as our two main characters continue to practice their baseball skills and still refuse to accept that by the end of the series they have to stop detesting each other and be a couple.  Superb scripting, good characterisations, and manages to make baseball seem interesting even if one has never played. A casually dressed  Aoba looks cute in the end credits too.

Fumi

I’m following several of the new Summer season anime.

Aoi Hana (Sweet Blue Flowers) is a rather sweet tale of girl-girl romance among high-school girls.  Fumi moves to a new district and a new school. She discovers that an old schoolfriend, A-chan, attends another school nearby. Fumi is miserable because her cousin recently got married. However she soon meets a tall and charming sempai at her new school.  Fumi, a tall, shy girl who cries rather easily, is very cute.

Tokyo Magnitude 8 is a bit different. It’s about a future earthquake of magnitude 8 and claims to be carefully researched.  It’s worth getting the 1st episode just to watch the pre-quake sequence – a beautifully scripted Day in the Life of a disgruntled schoolgirl who wishes everything would just self- destruct. Subsequent episodes mix dramatic collapses and tremors with the sort of situations survivors might find themselves in: queuing for toilets or tramping towards ferry terminals.

Spice & Wolf II is up to the standard of the previous series.

Bakemonogatari is about a schoolboy who discovers that a girl in his class is not quite normal. She falls in anime-style slow motion, he catches her and discovers that she doesn’t have any weight. Not one for the faint-hearted – in the opening sequence the wind blows up a girl’s skirt showing her underwear,  and when the ‘weightless’ girl suspects that the youth has been talking about her to someone else, she does something beastly to him with a trimming knife and a stapler. The animation is VERY arty.  The dialog is very good, and whle the wierdness is quite slow-paced it’s certainly interesting.

Also checked:

Taishou Yakyuu Musume is set in 1925, and is about some schoolgirls (some still wearing kimonos to school) who want to play baseball like the boys.  So-so.

Umi Monogatari is about two young sisters who live under the sea (!) and venture on land to return a beautiful ring which somebody has thrown into the sea. They innocently blunder about till they find the owner, and also trigger, or at least get involved in, some dark supernatural doings. Has some nice bright colours; might appeal to younger viewers.

Sora no Manimani is about a school astronomy club. An amusing comedy.

Kanamemo is about a 13-year old schoolgirl, Kana, an orphan who lives with her grandmother, until the old lady dies suddenly and creditors invade the house to reposess anything of value. Kana flees into the streets, and is taken in by an all-women newspaper collective. Three of them are lesbians, and while two are interested in each other …  This is a light comedy, but I should warn the unwary that while this might have played alright in Japan, some Western viewers, especially parents, may find themselves unamused.

Yokawaraku Gendaimahou: Magical drama. In the first episode, the young heroine, a rather irritating girl with a high opinion of herself, inherits a magical book and staff. Initially without any magical powers, she is chased by dangerous characters who want the staff. She also appears bare-assed in one scene for no valid reason. Avoid.

Just finished watching Tekkonkinkreet. Another neglected masterpiece! Unusually, it is directed by an American, Michael Arias, who was also involved with “Animatrix” etc.  Less unusually, it has a sound-track by two British musicians.  Having seen it, I have to say that perhaps Western direction is what anime needs to drag it out of the mediocricy into which it seems to be sinking.
Tekkonkinkreet (the original title of the manga better known here as “Black and White”) is a Japanese pun on the Japanese word for reinforced concrete.  Not that the story has anything much to do with concrete, but if you watch the whole thing you may agree that it kind of makes sense. While the manga was in, er, black and white, the movie explodes into glorious colour.  Two street brats clash with gangsters who are taking over their city.  The two brats, both of them rather crazy, are portrayed with remarkable depth and sympathy, and White in particular has some great lines.The characters are depicted with a sophistication that is far removed from typical anime, and succeeds notably in making the yakuza characters seem human as well as menacing and nasty. The art uses both painted backgrounds and computer graphics to allow the viewpoint to swerve up and down garish oriental buildings and along twisting township streets, in a way that older animation methods can’t.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tekkon_Kinkreet
It cost me £5 at HMV.

I pulled this off the shelf at random to watch again. It’s a 12-episode TV series from 2003,  later made available in the US by Geneon, and there is also a related movie (or OVA) series “Kara no Kyoukai” from 2007.

While some old series turn out not to have stood the test of time, this series seems even better on second viewing than I remembered. The orphaned Shiki returns to live with what remains of his family, but finds that unpleasant and frightening events are happening around him.    Shiki is not quite what he seems, or even who we thought he was, and the same applies to several other characters, that is, they’re not quite human.

In particular Shiki becomes involved with the white vampire Arcued, who insists that Shiki killed her and chopped her into 17 pieces. Indeed Shiki has a strange ability to see “lines” and when he cuts along these lines with his knife, things fall apart.

Shiki is put under severe stress. His schoolmates note a change in him, but obviously he can’t tell them the truth. He is terrified by the situations Arcueid leads him into, and in his new home he has to resort to sneaking out at night to meet Arcueid and evade the watchful eyes of his beautiful but severe sister, Akiha. The growing relationship between Arcueid and Shiki is well-handled, and the dialog, delivered by some fine voice-actors , makes this unlikely relationship the more believable.  For once, it’s played as a straight drama, with little or no attempt to over-egg it  or inject humour.

The least succesful characters are the ordinary school students, who appear sketchily defined and irritating.

Rideback is one of the more interesting of the winter season anime. Rin Ogata, a college student and former ballet dancer, discovers the college “Rideback” club one rainy day. Ridebacks are a kind of cross between motorcycle and robot. Rin is persuaded to have a go on a red “Fuego” Rideback to pass the time, and discovers that she has a natural affinity for controlling these machines, and that she finds it thrilling.

Politically, she lives in a world controlled by the GGP, who (we are told) are an obscure group who have suddenly conquered the world by the use of advanced military technology. They face some opposition in Japan from a group using terrorist tactics, who also use Ridebacks for their missions.

Soon Rin is racing against a much more experienced female club member, and matching her. She is entered for a national race, but using a less highly modified Rideback, the “Balon” which she doesn’t get on with so well. Afterwards, she uses “Fuego” to rescue her friend from a terrorist attack, in spectacular fashion.

I felt that the weakest part of this so far is the political stuff.  Clearly a major objective of the story is to get a nice-looking girl riding a cool piece of machinery, but the political background lacks some credibility.  To take over the whole world the GGP would have needed some very impressive weaponry and the strategic skill to use it, but we haven’t been shown it so far, and they just look like the usual totalitarian regime.

I’m also following:

Toradora! but the script seems (episodes 19,20) to be running out of steam. In episode 19 there is a lot of random and somewhat pointless action, and there is little sign that the scriptwriters are going to get a grip and resolve the relationships between the characters.  Nevertheless I like the small and furious Taiga Aisaka, the caring RyÅ«ji Takasu, the redhaired and changeable Minori Kushieda, and the tall, clever and gorgeous teen model Ami Kawashima. This series seem set to end in some disappointing and infantile way. Could it be that the “light novels” this is based on are also disappointing and infantile?

Maria-sama ga Miteru 4th: Back on form again with a uniformly interesting 4th series.  Sachiko has charged Yumi with finding someone to be her younger ‘sister’, but will it be Kanoko, Touko, or someone else? At episode 6, Yumi seems little nearer to making her mind up.

I also downloaded “Macross – do You Remember Love” Curious to see this 25-year old movie again; I first saw it at an anime convention, and later got a dub release of it (possibly as “Clash of the Bionoids”) M-DYRL is a an alternate retelling of the events of the original Macross television series, with new animation. Super Dimension Fortress Macross, to give it its full title, is a huge space ship that can transform itself for battle to something that looks more like a giant robot. The film revolves around three chief characters, Hikaru Ichijyo (a hot-shot pilot), coquettish pop-star Lynn Minmay, and the Fortress’ first mate Misa Hayase.

Sora wo kakeru shoujo (The Girl who Leapt Through Space) is a light space fantasy/comedy about a schoolgirl who resists an attempt by her family to marry her off to somebody she has never met, by embarking on an adventure involving a deserted space-colony controlled by a talking computer. On the whole I’d rather watch Macross DYRL.

Also checked: Genji Monigatari Sennenki – an anime adaptation of the famous Japanese classic writings. Gorgeous to look at, and the first episode is unexpectedly full of sex and sensuality.  Kurozuka first episode set in the historic Heian era, I think – fleeing noble is given refuge by a beautiful but blood-thirsty immortal.  Gorgeously animated, but have the feeling that the plot goes rapidly downhill as it goes rapidly future-wards.  Michiko to Hatchin is set in South America (where real-life Japanese settlers have a small foothold). Poorhouse girl being graphically and grossly mistreated by a selfish family of bourgeoisie who have “rescued” her is reclaimed by  her gun-toting criminal mother, who in a keynote scene arrives crashing through the window on a motorcycle. Looks like a lot of fun.

I’ve been enjoying Toradora!, Nodame Cantabile Paris Chapter, Eve no Jikan, and Kannagi. Sampled some others which I didn’t pursue.

Kannagi is another boy-meets-magical-girl anime. That said, it’s a delightful series. The hero carves a figure of a girl out of an old tree-trunk which came from the site of a shrine. He is shocked when the carving disintegrates and in its place appears an attactive girl, Nagi, who seems to be a manifestation of the shrine-goddess Kannagi. In time-honoured fashion, Nagi comes to live with him. The resulting complications are well handled, and are much to do with finding out who exactly Nagi is, a subject about which she herself seems vague. And she’s an appealing character, whih long hair, long legs and a white swishy miniskirt which probably absorbed much of the animation budget… There’s quite a lot of mild fanservice here.

A quick round-up of the spring and summer anime: I’m continuing to watch Itazura na Kiss and Kaiba, but dropped xxxHOLOC Kei as the plot wasn’t interesting.

Nogizawa Haruka no Himitsu The hero wastes little time in extablishing a relationship with the school “princess” after discovering her secret – she’s an anime and manga otaku. It’s fun but by about episode 5 I’m starting to feel that some of the elements are over-familiar.

Mahou Tsukai ni Taisetsu na Koto is a sort of sequel to “Someday’s Dreamers”. in which a witch girl leaves home in Hokkaido to start her apprenticeship in Tokyo. This is animated with very detailed and realistic backgrounds that rather out-shine the character designs. Modern setting with mobile phones etc. Not sure yet how good the story is going to be, and so far the heroine seems a little blandly “nice”.
Very realistic background art, but otherwise weak.

Yakushiji Ryouko no Kaiki Jikenbo – adult police drama which contains some supernatural elements (that’s apart from the lead female character being very rich, super-competent and gorgeous). The other main character is her put-upon male subordinate. Watchable.

Bounen no Xamdou has great production values and a very busy first episode introducing lots of interesting characters. There is also lots of action in the second episode. Not sure if I can take it seriously as it’s hard to suspend one’s disbelief at times, and there’s too much fun to be had playing “spot the influence”.

Eve no Jikan is set in a near-future world where many families have an android servant. The androids look and act exactly like humans but can be distinguished by the illuminated halo above their heads. They get treated much like the whites used to treat their black servants. The androids seem to be developing their own sub-culture, and there are some people who feel they should be treated more like humans… Though those who spend too much time with their androids are reviled as geeks. Fascinating stuff, and probably the best of the bunch so far, but there seems to be only 1 episode of this 6-episode ONA available at time of writing.