Shoujo & General Weblog

Asatte no Houkou (“A Direction of the Day After Tomorrow”)

Karada Iokawa is a young girl who transforms into a young woman. Shōko Nogami, a young woman who has just returned from studying abroad, happens to be the former girlfriend of Karada’s older brother. Shōko transforms into a young girl.

Akahori gedou hour rabuge: package name of pair of 12min-episode shows: Love Pheromone, about a pair of heroines who fight for justice but always cause more chaos than good, and Gedou Otome-Tai, about the five Hokke sisters, who are bent on becoming the world’s greatest Evil.

Otogi Zoshi (spotted in HMV shop, UK) – anime series set in Heian era Japan (1st 13 episodes, search for magical Magatama stones) and the present day (next 13 episodes).

Tenjho Tenge – martial arts/school anime with historic/supernatural overtones (not seen).

Comic Party – anime series inspired by, and satirizing the world of the Comiket dōjinshi or self-penned comic art conventions.

Cosprayers (Cosmopolitan prayers) a fantasy anime closely related to the anime Smash Hit, in that Smash Hit‘s lead character Mizuki Ikuta, a diminutive girl, teased for her size, is the producer of Houchiku Corporation’s anime CosPrayers. “Love Love” is the third anime in the trilogy.

Gankutsuou – is an anime series loosely based on Alexandre Dumas’ “Count of Monte Cristo”. The anime is notable for its unusual character designs and the rendering of clothing, etc.

Gedo Senki – “Ged’s World” or, Tales from Earthsea, the controversial anime movie adaptation of Ursula K. Le Guin ‘s “Wizard of Earthsea” novels. The movie was directed by Goro Miyazaki, son of the famous Hayao Miyazaki.

Hoshi no Koe = Voices of a Distant Star is a OVA by rising directorial star Makoto Shinkai, about two teenage lovers who communicate by text mail as they travel further and further apart.

Justy (Cosmo Police Justy) is an anime , made in 1985, in which the lead character is a police officer who hunts down criminal espers. He too is an esper, but wears a headband to limit his powers.

Komatsu Nana

I’d like to do a plug for Nana, an anime that has been around for a while, and is now in licensing limbo, in that it has been licensed in the US by Viz Media, but no release date is set. The Nana manga is by Ai Yazawa, who also wrote Gokinjo Monogatari and Paradise Kiss. All three manga feature young adult characters in the world of art school and fashion, and in the case of Nana, rock music. In each, the story concentrates on the love lives of the characters and their “adult relationships”.

The first episode of Nana has ditzy Komatsu Nana meeting punk Osaki Nana on an express train to Tokyo. Komatsu Nana meets her boyfriend, and sleeps with him at his flat, but is shocked when he makes it clear that he has no intention of letting her live with him. While flat-hunting, Komatsu Nana meets Osaki Nana again, and to save money they agree to share a flat in an old building. The opening credit music is Osaki Nana performing with her band.

All this turns out to be just a trailer for the rest of the anime. The next several episodes are flashbacks which show where these two girls came from, and by episode six or so we catch up with them at their shared flat. We also meet the other members of the two bands, Blast and Trapnest, and a few other minor Tokyo characters.

Some months ago I had watched only the first episode and while I liked it, I didn’t realise what a fascinating anime this was. There are a lot of interesting characters who do interesting things, and an insight into their world of bars, gigs, art school and music gigs. In short, a refreshing and welcome change from the production line of anime with school-student characters. Though they become friends, the two Nanas are very different. Komatsu Nana (“Hatchi”) doesn’t know what to do with herself and seems unable to manage without a boyfriend, while streetwise Osaki Nana is fixed on the goal of making a success of her band Blast.

Hikari

This shoujo sports anime dates from 1986, and is an example of what you can find on the web if you dig around. Only 3 episodes were ever fansubbed. It wasn’t a hit even at the time, but it still has a certain period charm.

Hikari, the pretty heroine, is rather good at rhythmic gymnastics. In the first episodes she shows just how good she is, defeating a sullen rival and being one of two girls from the school selected for the national championships. The other girl is Azuki, a talented senior whom Hikari admires. Hikari is encouraged by Ooshi, an older boy who is a national gymnastics champion. Hikari becomes interested in him, but he has a romantic interest in Azuki. Another friend of Hikari is Mao-kun, a rather punkish boy interested in pop music, who produces a tape of music for Hikari’s performance.

Anime Central UK is looking healthier than the late Anime Network. They’ve been running a series of marathons over Xmas (currently it’s “Bleach”), and when that ends they promise more goodies:

… the 5th of January 2008 will see a fresh line-up of shows introduced on the channel including first runs of Mobile Suit Gundam Seed, s-Cry-ed and Witch Hunter Robin.

However nobody has been in over the holidays to update the programme times on the website http://www.animecentral.com/whatson/, and the Sky EPG for this coming Saturday still has the show titles as for December.

The last new material was broadcast on Saturday 29 Dec (4x episodes of Poni Puni Dash). A repeat of “shounen” programming was shown on the Sunday, then no more. The Sky EPG shows the details of short films and British animation being shown by Propeller in this slot for the next several days. Series screening of Azumanga Daioh, Poni Puni, and the several “shounen” series is completed, but Kurau Phantom Memory remains uncompleted, with only 16 out of 24 episodes shown, so fans of this will have to wait for the DVD releases.
Meanwhile, nobody from the management has had the courtesy to make any announcement.

Sora (center) and friends

New anime – broadcasting Oct 2007. Don’t blame me for the naff-looking grammar of the title – that’s how it appears on the video. This is one of those quiet slice-of-life anime – Sora Kajiwara is a shy girl who is a member of the school Art Club and enjoys drawing things in her sketchbook. The club is supervised by a rather eccentric teacher.

Amiable and pleasant enough, and quite funny, but the character of Sora failed to really interest me and I couldn’t really get into the musings about life and the artistic process.

Kurau & Christmas

This show, dating from 2004, is showing on Anime Network Uk (BskyB channel 195, new ep Sats 21.20, repeats have been Mon-Fri 21.30). It’s a sci-fi drama, with almost all-adult characters. Set around the year 2100, in a future world which runs on “blue” energy, and where Dr Amani is experimenting with another more powerful energy source. His 12-year old daughter is allowed to visit the lab on her birthday. Unfortunately something goes wrong, and Kurau is struck twin bolts of light. What remains looks like his daughter, but contains two entities with fantastic powers.

As the series progresses, we learn more about “reneks“. Kurau, now an adult, is accompanied by her “pair”, Christmas, who exactly resembles the 12-year old Kurau. Kurau and Christmas are in hiding, constantly on the run from the GPO (I think this stands for “General Police organisation”) intent on using her for laboratory experments. There are other people who have been damaged by renek energy experiments. Kurau tries to maintain contact with her father, and is aided by the ex-GPO agent, Doug.

Kurau is pursued by the obsessed policewoman Ayaka Steiger, who reports to the rather sinister Inspector Wong. Another mystery surrounds Ayaka, who is the sole survivor of the slaying of her police officer father and his family some years previously.

Ayaka Steiger

Plus points of the series, apart from some lovely character designs and melancholic theme music, are the strong bonds of human affection between the various characters – Kurau, Christmas and Dr Amami, between Doug and his son, such heartwarming sentiment being rare in anime, and the plentiful dramatic action in the form of battles and chases.

The series is being released on DVD from ADV in the US and UK.