What anime are you watching right now? 2H15 to 1H16

[Gus Hanson]

...But is there anything that makes it different from another 5000 shows? Because at the end of the day someone can just watch Hentai if that is what they want.

The big bad uses kanji as the monster of the week for the Aquarion mecha to do battle with, if that counts for anything. Just give it a chance, you don't even have to have watched the other two shows that came before it to know what's up since it takes place in the present day.

[Mr. Tines]

Got around to the final episodes of Mushi-shi and Pleiades. The former suffered a bit from slow escalation, but was still suitably atmospheric. The latter remained bland to the end, with the characters barely getting beyond being colour coded ciphers -- and what is this disgusting heterosex doing in my mahou shoujo anime?

In the background, rewatching Akagi again, just about at the end of the Urabe match. The Washizu match is still on-going in the manga (though at the moment it looks like we're in for Washizu vs King Enma diversion). Tried a couple of episodes of Arpeggio of Blue Steel; and it's a harem show, isn't it? Waiting for a few more episodes of Prisma Illya to be out, getting past the beach episode, before starting that.

[Glor]

Tried a couple of episodes of Arpeggio of Blue Steel; and it's a harem show, isn't it?

I wanted to like Blue Steel, but the CGI gave me awful flashbacks of Knights of Sidonia, which was far worse in my opinion. Gonna' try and read the mangas for both of these.

[Gus Hanson]

*sigh* I'm starting to think that i should drop Aquarion Logos since who am i kidding, there's not a huge audience pining for it especially on this board. The two main male and female characters are stiffs in their obsessively dedicated ways and unless they start to break down past the vague flashbacks giving info on why they behave the way they do, the whole point to watching this heap would've been for nil.

[LeoXiao]

Started watching Kare Kano a few weeks ago. Interesting show, they really cut corners on the animation budget though.

[Compiling_Autumn]

About halfway through Mekaku City Actors. Hopefully I'll be finishing it sometime this week. So far, I'm really impressed, but that's me working under the assumption that all the plot ends will be explained by the series end.

[Bagheera]

After Michiko & Hatchin I marathoned Mai-Hime and both seasons of Honey and Clover. Mai-Hime was alright, but it led to some pretty tortured storytelling in the second cour; I didn't really mind the plot contrivances in the final episode because they effectively negated the really stupid shit that came before.

Honey and Clover was a far better show; Rika-san is obviously best girl, but the whole cast was pretty great. Shuu in particular really stood out for me; at first his relationship with Hagu struck me as really creepy, but the way he consistently and unfailingly enabled positive choices on her part at every turn, up to and including supporting her fully even if she chose to turn away from him, was pretty impressive. I haven't seen such a pure expression of love in a long time, and in contrast to most reviews I don't think it was unrequited; we're told that Hagu loves Morita, and she clearly does, but I think she loves Shuu as well. And, in fact, I think the love she holds for Shuu goes far deeper, as it's bundled with trust and faith as well. Shuu will never hurt her, and I think she knows this on a basic, instinctive level. Morita . . . well, we saw how that worked out.

Great show.

[pwhodges]

Last week I watched Kids on the Slope. I was impressed. There was a curious disagreement between reviews as to whether it was to slow or too rushed; well, for me it was just right, though the very end was slightly sketchy. I gather the manga is somewhat that way too, though. I can see how the show could be fleshed out - the manga is the same length as that of Honey and Clover which was made into an anime three times the length. The reason I use that comparison is that I also see a lot of similarity in the themes of those two shows, with the stories of misunderstanding, unrequited love, and personal links through art/music. Not least for its completeness Honey and Clover is the better show - it is after all one of the very best of all - but Kids on the Slope is a nicely balanced miniature that works well on its own terms. Recommended.

Now I am watching Michiko e Hatchin which I am also enjoying as a relaxation. The similarity to Cowboy Bebop in some respects is clear, and betrays Watanabe's part as producer. Watanabe also directed Kids on the Slope, and it's been interesting to juxtapose such different shows influenced by the same man (I just discovered he was also involved in the film Mind Game, which is a favourite of mine). Anyway, Michiko e Hatchin; I'm only halfway in, so I haven't yet got a final view of it, but I love the interaction between the main two characters. Of the two, though, it is Hana - Hatchin - whom I find the most endearing; a gorgeous combination of feisty, naive, moral, and vulnerable that's completely irresistible.

[Dr. Nick]

Starship Operators: Doesn't really work, and I'd say it's mostly because a single cour is simply insufficient length for a proper space opera. We're following a warship with a full crew complement, and as a result the vast majority of the cast only receives the thinnest coat of characterization. It's a big shame because the main gimmick of the show is a pretty refreshing one: Starship Operators takes it science fiction a little bit more seriously than your average anime space opera, and this leads to a lot of monitor-staring by space sailors who are distinctly nerdier than your average Space Battleship Yamato style hot-blooded ensigns and whalebone pipe smoking bearded admirals. And this makes perfect sense because SO's space warfare is a highly analytical affair that is all about relative speeds and sensor ranges. They even have honest-to-god light speed lasers (and reflectors to counter them), and at its best the ship-to-ship combat is like following a good techno-thriller.

Unfortunately the antagonists are paper-thin as well, and since the show doesn't use a LOGHian omniscient narrator to take care of the heavy exposition duties, it takes some time for the audience to realize that the whole conflict is simply an unremarkable tussle between some B-list nation states, and it ends in a hugely anticlimatic way when the Space UN ultimately rolls in and slaps both factions around bit and then trips over its own inexclicable villainy. Why make the Space UN a goofy surprise villain? It probably has to do with all the nationalistic fantasy-Nippon subtext. There's probably a lot to unpack here, but I'm just going to point out the most on-the-nose things: our heroes, who also represent their government in exile, are on a warship named Amaterasu. Their original antagonists, the kingdom, aren't particularly well-defined beyond their penchant for land-grabbing (and not having a cohesive visual style really hurts them as villains), but they do field ships with names such as Leyte and Marianas. And when the Space UN arrives and starts slapping everybody around, their fleet is led by an admiral named Truman. Subtle.

This is one of those flawed shows that are more unremarkable than just plain bad in any terrifying way, but considering how much freakishly good animated space opera Japan has pumped out, it shouldn't be high on anyone's viewing list.

[Squigsquasher]

I remember seeing an advert for Starship Operators on DVD in a sci fi magazine once. Of course, being 12 at the time I was somewhat distracted by the other anime DVDs being advertised in the magazine, as those DVDs happened to be Witchblade, complete with heaving Giger-tits, and something called Daphne Is The Brillliant Blue or something, which had a scantily clad dark-skinned beauty with a pair of pistols on the cover, so obviously the incredibly tame jumpsuits of the 3 astronauts on the cover of Starship Operators didn't quite grab the attention of my pubescent mind.

Of course I haven't watched any of them and with what I've heard about Witchblade (it's GONZOshit with a rather cavalier attitude to the source material) and this review, I'm highly unlikely to...

[Gus Hanson]

After a long hiatus, I finally watched the last two episodes of Rail Wars! It wasn't a strong finale as I expected considering the lack of conclusion included and the enormous amounts of fanservice within complete with two instances of stocking removal per episode. Not expecting a second season anytime soon.

[Sicarius VI]

About halfway through Mekaku City Actors. Hopefully I'll be finishing it sometime this week. So far, I'm really impressed, but that's me working under the assumption that all the plot ends will be explained by the series end.

I watched one episode of that because my friend told me to, I plan to finish it eventually.

Gangsta.- Is the only show from the current season I have gotten to watch, and I must say it was a lot more 'adult" then I thought. Honestly I thought it was going to be like Baccano!, but I am wrong, and for very good reason. 5th episode threw me for a loop, so looking forward to the 2nd 1/2 of the season.

Also watching One Piece, and on Episode 150 now. Some of the earlier filler I wish I skipped because it was crap like Apis. Taking a break on it to finish other shows that seem to be "must watch" in the anime community like Death Note, and Madoka Magica.

[C.A.P.]

Saw the new DBZ movie. Walked away from it as a happy lad. Go see it.

[IronEvangelion]

I watched the first episode of Persona: Trinity Soul. It managed to be both dull and confusing at the same time. If the second episode doesn't grab me, I'll most likely drop it. I didn't even get any Persona vibes from it until that brief instance when Igor showed up. I was expecting something closer to Persona 4, but this show seems to be going the grimdark route.

[Dr. Nick]

Yamamoto Yohko TV ep. 14: No, you are a lazy, lifeless show, and you are not winning me over by putting Batman, Black Jack and Shin Getter Robo in the same episode. A good try though.

[Alaska Slim]

^It should have learned from your thrashing of Space Runaway Ideon.

As I recall, not even light saber duels on the Planet of the Apes could bring warmth to your cold, stoney heart.

[Rosenakahara]

So i finally got around to watching Slayers Revolution and Evolution-R (in reality i literally just found out they exist despite being a massive Slayers fan).
And this series...........feels kinda pointless, let me explain that a bit more:

SPOILER: Show

OK so to start off with slayers revolution i actually think this started off strong, it had a lot of ties and references to the other seasons and had the inspector who i loved and was a great character edition to the cast, the humor was good as always and it had that classic slayers feel, the dub cast was mostly intact so i felt like i was that little girl sitting at home watching slayers in a tiny lina cosplay (something i still actually have today though it doesn't fit me at all any-more, fun fact it was the first and only one me and my mother ever actually made by hand) i was grinning from ear to ear throughout most of the series.

HOWEVER the moment xellos showed up despite being a character i enjoy immensely the series started to take a turn for the worst because at that point the series sort of began to feel like those references were turning into crutches and retreads.
Rezo being a central plot character again is something i was wary but kinda open to when he was first brought up since he didn't get that much looked into in terms of as a character in the first arc of the show but his effects on the world lasted long after he was dead; only problem here was that as the show progressed it became very clear they only brought back Rezo, constantly referenced Fibrizo and had ol' Ruby eyes show up for the sake of banking in on some nostalgia.

Seriously while revolution had me kinda rolling my eyes at Zanaffar because this had already been done with Copy Rezo you could still sorta argue it was something that had not been done before, Ruby eyes was literally just the Demon King we saw killed at the end of arc 1 without any variation and Lina use the Giga Slave AGAIN to defeat him, speaking of lets get into some continuity errors.

First off: any-time xellos was on-screen he was a very high ranking monster and we all understood that but......i seem to remember xellos getting his ass kicked by Chaos Dragon Garv back in next, not forgive me if im wrong but Garv DID actually get seriously injured in the battle with Lina & co before he was murdered by the Hellmaster and while they didn't kill Garv the guys acting like beating xellos is impossible and then getting their asses whooped is just............no.

Second: Shabranigdu's power level is just fucking stupid here, look i get that he is the Demon King and all but.......seriously? he somehow got STRONGER after losing several pieces of his Demonic Soul? forgive me but imma have to call bullshit on this especially since i distinctly remember our heroes doing enough to piss Ruby Eyes off before the first time they fought before the Giga Slave but here he just DESTROYS them without any effort whatsoever.

Third: This pissed me off the most "I used the Giga Slave once before" "once before" "ONCE" look im just going to put that down as a dub error but Lina remembered at least activating the Giga Slave before the Lord of Nightmares took over her body so that would be twice Lina not once and they reused the exact same internal conflict Lina had with the spell from next and the Copy Rezo section, WHAT THE FUCK, im sorry but that's just bad reusing and i guess the Lord of Nightmares is just totally cool with Lina borrowing her power whenever now instead of having the risk of blowing up the planet or taking her body as payment, the woman who started an eternity spanning war for her amusement is just so generous like that.

Fourth: While on the subject of Copy Rezo.......sylphiel did you just forget you fought Zanaffar before when Copy Rezo was using it?
You remember flagoon the holy tree well enough but then seem to forget the entire reason the gang was down there.

Now lets get onto some serious missed opportunities this series had, and to get the big one out of the way:
Why in the ever-loving fuck does Naga vanish halfway through the series!?
Nama was a fun little distraction and helped to set up Naga coming back to the series and finally get in Lina's way again, it would have been AMAZING and we could finally get her on-screen with her sister, instead what we get is "kinda Naga but not really and then she's gone" i just.........why even bother if you wont bring her back, why have that freakout with the assassin hinting at her backstory, why have that iconic laugh, i just.......man i just really want to see Naga again, i can only rewatch the OVA's and Specials so many times ;^;

Rezo is brought back yet his character is no more explored than when he was first introduced........why? why even bother at that point? i get it nostalgia and all but there are better ways to do this.

Didn't foreshadow the doll (who i have forgotten the name of because she was just a walking trope) having emotions enough, maybe the voice direction was TOO good because she felt emotionless and dull until the pot started being passed around like a soulless puppet would do so i didn't feel bad when she died at all.

Didn't have enough filler.
Yes i cant believe im saying this but slayers does filler RIGHT so much that i actually kind of miss it in this more plot driven progression, it kinda makes the series feel like one big massive rush at the end of evolution-r and that's.........not the best feeling.

Gourry never got the blast sword!
Look i get the sword of light is iconic and all but can we at least get some blast sword love over here? because his swords were broken 90% of the time it made Gourry useless in crucial moments and i didn't appreciate that, boy may be dumb as rocks but you shouldn't take his sword skill away from him too which shows they really missed a chance by not giving him the blast sword in tri.

Oh hi sylphiel!
Oh......bye sylphiel i guess?
Guess having a Dragon Slave level priestess that can also heal just as well as your designated white mage isn't useful in any way to keep around, though i do like her having hinata's voice actress, it suits her.

So many wasted characters that never show up again, remember when martina stuck with the gang all through next despite being the worst fucking mage ever? i do.

I would go into characters and the like but only problem there is this post is already really long as it is, don't want an even bigger wall of text, my love of Slayers means i cant say i hate this or anything and it is a decent continuation but neither revolution nor evolution-r can hold a candle to Slayers-Tri and judged on its own merits it's..........not that good.
Still though i did have some fun with it while it lasted and it made me want to go watch the OVA's and the series again and i cant say i didn't get chills when the Slayers Next theme started playing.

[Kazuki_Fuse]

Marathoning my way through Working!! Already on episode 3 of season two and I just started last night. It's fantastic.

[Dr. Nick]

^It should have learned from your thrashing of Space Runaway Ideon.

As I recall, not even light saber duels on the Planet of the Apes could bring warmth to your cold, stoney heart.

Surely I haven't been thrashing Ideon since I've always expressed the opinion that it actually gets really good once it finally drops the enemy-of-the-week grind and gets to proper cosmic horror. It certainly takes a long while to get there, but they payoff is well worth it.

Yohko TV, on the other hand, doesn't seem to be gearing up for a similar end game sprint, but I'll get back to it once I trudge through the last few episodes. Let me just say that it horrifies me that it came out in 1999 because it looks like the cheapest and most deservedly forgotten TV anime of 1990, and it horrifies me even more to think that Futurama began in 1999. A coincidence like that feels like some divine act of balancing the books. Yohko TV manages to squeeze so little enjoyment out of its time displacement scenario that Philip J. Fry had to step in.

[Alaska Slim]

Surely I haven't been thrashing Ideon since I've always expressed the opinion that it actually gets really good once it finally drops the enemy-of-the-week grind and gets to proper cosmic horror. It certainly takes a long while to get there, but they payoff is well worth it.

Hmm, maybe I was thinking of something Azathoth said then...

Arpeggio of Blue Steel;

Innocent Venus, Grisaia, now this.

Shows with submarines just haven't been doing well with me recently, though I'll admit this most recent entry at least had a proper justification to feature one.

So anyway... It's pretty bland. Even the highlight of the show, the tactics, kind of just get displaced by beam spam towards the end. The animation feels like a slipshod version of Freedom Seven or Sidonia. The characterization are pretty one note, though I suppose you don't come to these shows for that sort of thing anyway.

Still, I'd like to point out that the MC is perhaps the blandest I've ever encountered. We don't get any real feel for the guy, other than that he knows tactics, and cares for his ships... That's it. Even the dude's motivation feels like it's phoned-in.