Postby Merridian » Sat Oct 09, 2010 1:23 am
First off, I finished Casshern Sins. In one word: disappointing. It was mostly a very slow, poorly paced adventure tale in the vein of Kino’s Journey for the first half or so, before growing more and more plot-oriented as it progressed into the later episodes. Initially, the character relationships were rather weak and IMO pretty badly developed, but as the later episodes wore on they gained a little depth. Just not enough to make them great or memorable, unfortunately. The characters themselves were developed well enough, I guess. Main problem was just that most of them were annoying—but the writing didn’t help that at all. In fact the amount of sledgehammer melodrama in this show was absolutely absurd; it’s hard to take fabulously-dressed supermodel characters with freaky hair-dos so seriously when they’re seriously trying to talk seriously about serious things in a serious barren grimdark post-apocalyptic wasteland. I can’t handle that much seriousness gibbergabber from characters that look so hilarious. The way the series ends manages to reel some of this in a little—at least enough for me to actually care about the characters after all this srs bidniss nonsense—but even the last episode comes off as unnaturally paced and disappointingly predictable.
But the show wasn’t all bad. The animation was pretty good and there was an abundant amount of great action throughout each episode. The maudlin drama weighed down much of the action, but it wasn’t always in a negative way. The art direction was also pretty good as well, combining an Imaishi-esque style of ‘maximalism’ in the character designs and action portrayal with stark but beautifully rendered and drawn backgrounds that remain consistent throughout the whole run.
All said and done, I give it a 6/10.
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Now with that out of the way,
Thoughts on the first eps of this Fall season:
Panty & Stocking – “lolGainax” is about all that needs to be said. Imaishi & Yoshinori being total badasses with about as much cartoonishness as can possibly be fathomed. Hell of an hilarious thrill ride, to say the least. With deliciously fluid eye candy, to boot.
My Little Sister Can’t Be This Cute – not entirely sure why I picked this up last Sunday, but I’m glad I did. Though the title seems rather misleading; with the way the show’s kicked off, it shoulda been called “Tsuntsun Sis and Her Badass Bro”. The protagonist might as well have been forged right from the same fires of normalcy and sarcasm that spawned Kyon.
STAR DRIVER – WHAT.
WHAT THE FUCK DID I JUST
OH SHIT
Bones making a mecha show with an engaging, entertaining, rewarding plot? More likely than you think! Star Driver has already exceeded my expectations, which admittedly wasn’t hard since I knew next to nothing about the show going into it. It’s well on its way to out-Fabulousing Utena and out-weirding Aquarion in terms of characters and setting. When the standard tactic for a TV show is to kick off the series with a mindblowing and attention-grabbing first episode, Star Driver exceeds every other show this season. Even P&S and Index.
speaking of which,
A CERTAIN MAGICAL MOTHERFUCKING INDEX S2 – FFFFFFFFFFFFUCK YEAH IT’S BACK IN ACTION! This was the show I was most looking forward to since its announcement, seeing as how I gobbled up the first season along with Railgun a few months ago. The compelling and well-grounded cast of characters are all returning with force, as is expected for an adaption of a LN series, this time with glorious budgeting and an excellent soundtrack. Academy City never looked so goddamn good. And neither did Misaka.
I can’t wait for Accelerator to come back into the plot, I must admit. In fact, he needs his own series. Misaka got one and it turned out great. What’s wrong with giving this psychopathic lunatic comprised solely of mentally unstable badassitude his own season-long show? It’d be the best show airing, without a doubt. That mental instability, that laugh, that power, those horrific implications—it’d be perfect!
and lastly, waiting on subs for Soredemo Machi.