Spring 2011 Anime

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[A Black Falcon]

Battle Maidens (Sengoku Otome) 03 - Another meh episode in this meh show, why didn't I drop it? At least this isn't a harem show, it does have that going for it, but our main character's pretty useless (apart from when she's not because the plot requires it) and the plot is generic silly. Also, so is this going to be another mostly violence-free war show, like a worse Koihime Musou? Ep. 1 had the aftermath of a real battle, but now our heroine is convincing Nobunaga to use non-fatal challenges instead of actual war... I admit, she did say that she didn't want to kill the other person, but really, silly challenges? That'd only happen in a show like this. :)

Despite that the episode was amusing, this show's silly stuff even if it is obviously unbelivable and doesn't make much sense. I'll probably keep watching at least a little longer. The kite fight at the end was entertaining stuff. :)

Hyakka Ryokan Samurai Girls 12, Alternate BD version - This is an expanded and somewhat altered version of Samurai Girls' final episode. It's 26 minutes long now. The first half or so of the episode goes pretty much like how I remember the original version going, but the second half changes somewhat significantly, and for the better. Episode 12 as it was was already the best episode of the series, but now it's by FAR the best episode. This actually was good, actually, I thought, and not just for this series -- for anime action, this was probably good stuff. The original version of ep. 12 was almost good, this bumps it up a little. I wouldn't recommend watching this show, because most of the first 11 episodes are pretty lame, but at least it has a good ending. The action's very well done, they clearly put some effort into the animation. Also I still love this show's paper filter, it makes it look much cooler than it actually is. :)

Also, I liked the new additional scene at the end. Nice thing to see. :)

The Legend of Koizumi (ova series, watched part of it) - Now THAT is awesome stuff! This is a mahjong series with major world leaders playing high-stakes games of mahjong. It's completely, totally awesome and excessive, in all the best/worst ways. I mean, in a lot of way the series is pretty obvious complete junk, but it's so completely over the top that not only does that not matter, it's the whole point. Just brilliant stuff, I wish there was more of it. Saki has some of this show's excessive stuff going on during mahjong matches, but this goes even farther than that show does, to some great results. :)

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The Angel Cop manga is actually an adaptation of the OVA series.

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Oh, really, the anime was first? Interesting.

I remember you reviewed Angel Cop some time ago, it was indeed pretty stupid but sometimes entertaining stuff, and got so absurd by the end... :)

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It's definitely rife with the awesome badness of the 80's [even though it didn't start until 1989 and wasn't finished until 1994].

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Yeah, it feels so much more ridiculous '80s cheese than '90s anime, it is surprising that it didn't finish until '94.

Battle Girls 04 - More moderately entertaining stuff, in a show that doesn't exactly take itself (or its subject) very seriously. :) So two characters are fighting an endless series of duels that they always draw. Nobunaga wants their armor of course, so after quite a while of watching their absurdity she intervenes and crushes them both. One demands death before dishonor, but the other intervenes to save her, proving Hideyoshi's point that they actually were friends and not enemies right. Nobunaga decides to spare them both. This is a pretty nice Nobunaga compared to the historical one. Okay episode, if nothing special.

05 - This show is amusing. It's not great, but it's okay. Still feels like a not as good Koihime Musou (first season) clone -- supposedly set in a historical period, all relevant characters are female versions of male characters, mostly bloodless fighting and comedy instead of serious war -- but while it isn't as good, it is entertaining. In this episode, we see that even the zombies support Nobunaga. Also, Tokugawa's kind of suspicious, for sure...

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Super Atragon 1-2 (complete) - Meh... I got bored by the middle of the first episode and stayed that way. Only partially paid attention, I had other things to do on my computer like try to figure out how to get some files that didn't want to move to another drive.

Super Atragon had some nice action at times, but the plot was lame and only halfway there, because the ending is only a beginning and it never continued to say what happened next. I don't care that much, but it was a sign in general of the lacking plot I would say. There is exposition, but it's not particularly interesting. Evil being from inside the earth trying to kill all humans, nearly invincible giant rings, ships blowing up, etc. I don't know, I just wasn't particularly interested. Sure, it has lots of stuff blowing up, along wiht the background story scenes and mediocre character drama parts, but still, it was definitely on the boring side. The music was pretty good, but it was also likely the best thing about the show...

Akagi 12-13 - Huh, decent show. Very serious and somewhat dark though, I like the more fun tone of Koizumi and Saki more than this. Still, it's clearly a pretty good show, and had a great sense of tension through the match... and then the second episode, where we learned Akagi's reasoning, was as ridiculously silly as you expect from this genre. So yeah, pretty good, but not my favorite style in this genre. I may watch more though, not sure.

Oh, and that character art in this show is so ridiculously bad... it's obviously intentional, but those people are really, really ugly!

Nabari no Ou 01 - Meh, pretty mediocre.

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Hansaku Iroha's been tanking pretty bad in the past few episodes, will probably drop soon. Which is disappointing, because it started out really well.

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Too bad... I stopped watching after one episode though, just didn't seem intresting enough for me to want to continue. I've heard some of how it's slipping, but what exactly do you dislike about it now?

It's just getting too generic, digging up old anime cliches and tropes for no reason when those things had seemed mostly absent from the earlier episodes. Also, Ohana is slowly warping from "strong-willed, if a bit misguided" to "ditzy airhead with lots of conviction". There's also a looming love triangle, that I'm not looking forward to.

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Deadman Wonderland

Here's another that I'm coming down off of. Too much of Ganta being the most clueless/naive/"Huh?!" anime lead ever and the main villain is way too one-dimensional and non-threatening to really work [and he's the anime villain archetype, used over and over again]. Needs more of the crazy action/game show stuff from Episode 2.

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I've seen one of those before, Space Transformers. Hilariously awful in all the right ways.

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Space Thunder Kids is legally available for viewing online on archive.org, if you want to be entertained/suffer through the movie... :)

http://www.archive.org/details/SpaceThunderKids

I haven't seen anything like it before, but it does make me kind of interested in seeing more ripoff animes like this. I mean, it was horrible, but sort of interesting, in how it uses footage from seven shows and combines them all into one movie...

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A company called Digiview Entertainment released a whole bunch of those a few years ago:

http://www.amazon.com/SPACE-TRANSFORMERS...pd_sim_d_3

http://www.amazon.com/Raiders-Galaxy-Ani...pd_sim_d_1

http://www.amazon.com/Space-Thunder-Kids...pd_sim_d_2

http://www.amazon.com/Solar-Adventure-An...pd_sim_d_3

http://www.amazon.com/Defenders-of-Space...pd_sim_d_4

http://www.amazon.com/Beauty-Warrior-200...pd_sim_d_5

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If I want to watch a stupid, fanservicey bad show this season, Softenni is a better choice for sure.

There's a fairly wide gulf between Softenni and A Channel.

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There is a gap, yes, but both definitely have more than their share of fanservice. I guess you're right that Softenni has more (it's like half of the show), but A-Channel is a fanservicey show as well... just because it has less doesn't mean it isn't quite fanservicey.

Also, as I said Softenni is sometimes funny, while A-Channel is just mostly boring. A-Channel isn't completely awful, but it isn't very good either.

Strike Witches 01-02 - I don't mind this show. I'd avoided it in part because I thought if I watched some I might want to actually watch it and I didn't really want to do that given how stupid the concept is, but now I guess I can't avoid it... :(

I do think it helps the show a little that while none of the girls have pants/skirts nobody makes an issue out of it (so far at least), though; that's just how things are. That makes it much less bad than it could be. It's still very stupid and wrong otaku-bait -- why does everyone else wear pants/kimonos/etc, but not young girls -- but it could be worse. In the series that kind of dress is simply normal.

As for the plot, it was alright. It's the 1940s and aliens invaded the Earth, and only magic can stop them -- normal military force is useless. So, the main character's father invented flying leg-attachments that apparently only work on teenage girls (making them planegirls of sorts), who then fly around and fight the badguys. Um... no ulterior motives there at all, I'm sure... but he's dead now, so we can't ask.

Earth Maiden Arjuna 07-09 - Gah... episode 9, so offensively insane... :(

Even so though, I didn't hate the show for it, I just strongly disagree with the message and concept. On that note I have some strong disagreements with their main complaint in episode 7(-8) as well, while words can divide they also bring together, and history, etc. are every bit as important as the other things Chris mentions. The idea that only the earth and the now matter are completely absurd.

Also, yeah, Chris continues to be really annoying. Just tell her things! Stop acting angry at Arjuna for not understanding you without any explanation, actually explain things and make everything better. But no, instead he insults, and even attacks, her while continuing to criticize her for fighting back against the enemies. Even when Arjuna begins to understand some of his motivations, he refuses to explain more of them and continues being annoying.

Also, so this show cares about the pesticides and preservatives in food and drink, but not about what you do with the waste (Tokio tosses a can in the trash and Arjuna says nothing). Also apparently they aren't bothered by the potential negative health effects of cellphones because they come across in a quite positive light here, in ep. 8 I think. It's just odd when a show criticizing so many things passes on certain ones.

As for episode 9... yeah, anti-sanity, anti-science, anti-reality, and anti-female (because opposing abortion is very much anti-female). Just sad. And insanely weird too, as some people have said -- fetuses are aware, almost omnipotent? What? It's so, so stupid...

Kampfer: fur die Liebe 1 (aka Kampfer 13) - This is the actual Kampfer fur die Liebe 1; the one from April is actually the second episode, even though it released first (I thought it was first, then, and called it #1). And this is a gigantic improvement over that one. I mean, that episode had some amusing harem antics, with more sexual content than the TV series had, but this episode actually advanced the plot, which was badly needed. It's got some sexual content too for sure, but it's actually in the name of the plot, not just random stuff like the other episode.

So, this episode continues from where episode 12 left off, after the first battle between the goodguys and the white kampfer badguys. The four goodguys are trying to think of what to do now that they know that Sakura is with the enemy for sure. The idea comes up that evil, moderator-aligned Sakura and "regular" Sakura actually might be separate personalities; that is that the "regular" one doesn't know about the other. Huh, perhaps... but the evil side sure seems to be the dominant one.

But yeah, this episode was good, I liked it. :) The good and bad kampfers face off again, after Sakura turns one against the other goodguys (temporarily) and tries to seduce Natsuru (both genders) as well. It might have worked, given how much Natsuru likes her no matter how many times he/she is told or reminded that she's evil, if the other two goodguys hadn't shown up just in time. Apparently Sakura doesn't get hurt when shot, huh. There was a bullethole in her clothes I think, but it didn't look like it even made a dent on her skin...

Also, the episode ends with Sakura and her four white kampfer underlings all in her bed together, naked. Well I think we know what they were doing.

So yeah, this episode definitely made me wish that the series was continuing. At minimum I hope we get more OVA episodes in the future, the story still has a long way to go.

Nichijou 09 - Funny as always... some of these skits were pretty good stuff. The food one was amusing for instance, how she lost it at the end was funny and somewhat realistic. :)

Great episode as always!


New Cutey Honey 1-4 - Well that sure was straightforward in its fanservice quotient... lots of nudity. Lots of fighting too, as Honey defeated the bad guys. This is the first I've seen of this franchise, and it was entertaining. I'll probably watch the second half too.

There were some negatives about it, though. The kid was kind of annoying, for sure, for one; he's pretty genericly shonen and irritating at times, except he has no fighting skill so all he does is constantly get in trouble and need to be rescued. And while Honey is mostly a solid character, the parts where she fights badly until one of the other characters gets attacked or something, and then suddenly after that she can fight better, definitely get old...

Lotte's Toy 07 - Cuteness and lolis... but what else do you expect from this series. I still highly doubt I'll finish it, I'll lose interest completely and drop this at some point.

Hidan no Aria 07 - This show is so so so bad, but I keep watching anyway... it's probably partially because of these awesome subs, partially because it does often hit "so stupid it's kind of funny" levels, and partially because of the ridiculous action it has at times.

As for this episode in specific, I assume that at some point our hero will be forced into hero mode again, to save the day when the girls falter. Hasn't quite happened yet, in fact Aria just saved him (because he refuses to go into cool mode unless he's forced to; he really, REALLY just wants to be a subpar, generic guy.), but he's got to do something again eventually. At least Aria was on top of things, while our idiot MC wasn't.

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Man, Strike Witches is fanservice central. I've managed to avoid it so far and that's how I'd like to keep things.

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A Channel continues to be about nothing, yet I continue to like it. Even though I know it's a totally guilty pleasure, I still consider it to be one of my favorite slice of life shows, behind Azumanga Daioh, Aria, Soredemo Machi, and a few others. I'd even put it above Lucky Star and Pani Poni Dash.

Still staying current on Fireball Charming as well. So random.

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A-Channel is so boring, what do you see in it?


The Twelve Kingdoms 36-39 - Peak point of the series, I imagine! This part was great, there was lots of action and events moved quickly. It was great to see 12-plus episodes of foreshadowing and planning finally result in something. I still think that overall this show is too slow paced, but this part wasn't.

It definitely made me annoyed that the anime stops here, though... this is only the middle of the story, I know there's another half of the book series left that this doesn't cover. What happens after this? Who knows, we never will apparently, and as most of the books aren't available in English, we won't anytime soon either I guess. :(

As for the story, the three main female characters get along well, and did good work, along with the rebel armies, in winning the day. It was great to see that in the last of these episodes even Keiki actually did something useful, he hadn't in quite a while (if ever). :) Also, the true mastermind of the evil group is revealed... interesting, I did suspect him but it wasn't absolutely certain until he gave himself away in these episodes. Fortunately, Youko was much less passive and unresisting than he expected, and his scheming actually was key in causing the badguys' downfall. Things would have been much more difficult without that royal army there to use to defeat the villains with. :)

I must say though, three people going up against a whole army, even just as a stalling tactic, and they all survive fine? Youko has those spirits helping her, sure, but that other guy was just a bear, and the third just a human... I know, this is anime and in anime such things are possible even against hails of arrows, but it is kind of silly. Most of the rest of the fights were reasonable, though.

I also like Youko's choice for a first proclamation. Trying to modernize the Twelve Kingdoms' social customs a bit, huh, by banning genuflecting? Great idea!

It's just really too bad that the series doesn't go anywhere much after here, and that the rest of the book series wasn't animated.

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A-Channel is so boring, what do you see in it?

It's lighthearted fun with few catches. But if you want something specific, the characters, I suppose.

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Pumpkin Scissors 03 - This show is okay, but not great. Still it is good enough to keep watching I guess. In this episode, we see that our heroine's father and older sisters are generically nobility and don't appreciate what she's doing. She reacts by fasting because the poor people are starving while she has always had food. Your dedication is good, but that's not the best approach... she figures that out eventually, but it takes a while. Also, they convince some skeptical towns people (who had been exploited by the military before) to work with them restoring a tunnel.

Street Fighter II V 05-07 - This show... it's mostly boring, but some of it is pretty silly, so much odd subtext... and yeah, in ep. 5 that was the worst-directed movie scene ever, no question. That is not how they make movies. Ep. 7 was the best of these probably, it seemed okay... or maybe it's just that I was paying a bit less attention and it didn't seem as bland? At least now we see that Chun Li can actually fight. Why didn't she earlier, in that fight in the Kowloon Palace when her fighting might have been helpful? Oh well... also, Ryu's closer to learning Hadoken. Still, overall this show is boring.

Strike Witches 04-05 - I can't help it, I still find this show entertaining. It's not that bad really... yeah, they all have no pants or skirts on, and there's a lot of fanservice, but the action is decently good and the story's interesting enough. It's also amusing.

Of course it is messed up too, no question, but it's watchable anyway.

Sailor Moon 12-19 - Amusing, and certainly far better than the dub. The dub is so bad, but the sub is entertaining stuff. Too many episodes gets boring though... watching eight straight episodes is not recommeded. And also, why don't the badguys go to any other city on earth and collect energy there? Why do to the one with the sailor senshi in it? It's pretty stupid. It's a pretty blatant plot hole, really.

Softenni 08 - Guilty pleasure indeed, but it's entertaining anyway...

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Inukami 01 - It's like a bad Urusei Yatsura ripoff, but newer and with male nudity instead of female. This is clearly a pretty bad show, but the episode did have some amusing moments -- that the MC guy actually does go after girls, but his green-haired girlfriend hurts him for it, obviously comes straight from UY, but it's not all just a clone, there's a mild mystery aspect as well. And all that male nudity, a lot of it from our hero, when the girl teleports his clothes away when she's angry with him. He spend several nights in jail for that... In this episode, they have to stop a vile fiend who can make clothing disappear. Hilarity ensues.

This isn't a good show, and I don't know if I want to watch more, but it's not THAT bad either, and at least it's a little bit different if not much. I was moderately entertained I guess.

Street Fighter II V 08-10 - Wha... I don't get it, Ryu and Sagat are friends and allies? This goes against everything I have ever known about Street Fighter!

Also, Sagat doesn't have his scar yet here. So is this series a prequel to Street Fighter 1?

Anyway, in these episodes Ken and Ryu go to Thailand. Once they arrive, Ken gets arrested and thrown in jail for posession of heroin. He was set up though, it was done by one of the guys who attacked the dojo in ep. 7. Apparently they're connected to a big international crime syndicate based in Thailand. Through Ken's connections to the US government (remember, Ken's father is super ultra wealthy) he gets Ryu out, but not before Ryu learns about the evils of drugs and makes friends with Sagat, the top guy in the prison.

Yes, here Sagat is good, not evil. He befriends Ryu and refuses to work with the crime syndicate, choosing a longer sentence instead of working with the drug gang and also, along with Ryu, resists the corrupt, abusive prison warden. He's good friends with Ryu by the time Ken gets Ryu out. Isn't Ryu nice, making friends with all these guys during his travels... never mind that Ryu and Sagat are bitter enemies in actual SF canon, here they're quite the opposite. Oh, also, of course, these episodes serve to be the antidrug episodes. There are a few somewhat heavyhanded speeches, but it works overall; the focus on the evils of drug gangs are quite obviously accurate.

In the end of course, after some drama, the badguys are taken down and our heroes move on to go to India and meet Dhalsim, who Sagat tells them is apparently the master of the Hadou, which Ryu really wants to learn about Um... okay. That doesn't sound too much like SF canon either. I think this is definitely in some alternate universe... :)

Princess Princess 01 - Crossdressing anime about a boys' school which has certain, prettier boys dress up as girls for the greater good of the rest of the student body. Um, there's nothing wrong with crossdressing at all (I prefer magical transformation stuff, but crossdressing's alright too), but their excuse for it here is really bad... really really bad... also, this show is slow -- at the end of the episode our hero still hasn't learned whether he's going to be one of them yet or not. Of course anyone who saw the OP knows he of course will. (Oh, and the ED seems like it's suggesting BL themes.) Overall it was okay, but could have been better with better pacing and a better reason for the crossdressing. Oh well.

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Nichijou 10 - This show needs less Mai trolling. Some of it's funny, but there's way too much of it. Still though, overall this was a pretty funny episode as always.

Battle Girls 08 - Good episode. This episode is about our three main characters' continuing trip towards the place with the other armor parts. In this one, they run into some difficulties, go off the road, and get lost. They can't keep going along the normal route because bad rumors about Nobunaga had spread -- that she ate the children of women in her area, specifically. It was all a backfired plan by her underling, jealous of how Nobunaga seems to be paying more attention to our heroine than her, sent out ninjas to spread good rumors about her. It didn't quite work right and the rumors... changed in transit, as such things sometimes do, so now everyone flees from them on sight. Good stuff. :)

So, they end up traveling cross country, through some ridiculous terrain, such as going straight up cliffs. The main character realizes how tough life is in this world, and is getting skeptical about how long she'll survive here... life is much harder and shorter than in modern Japan, to say the least, and she's not exactly prepared for all the walking and danger. Later on she gets sick with a cold. Nobunaga does what she can, but there's not much to do. Luckily the other person from modern times (her teacher I think?), the one whose portal our idiot heroine fell through, was in the area and secretly dropped off a cold pill for her, which Nobunaga gave her. The main character still doesn't know who the teacher is here, though, I think...

Anyway, so in the end they get to their destination. Looks like there'll be a fight now, these people won't just give up the armor pieces...

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SKET Dance has been a surprise hit for me. I read some of the manga [a few chapters] and it seemed okay, if a bit generic, but the series is really growing on me. Lots of great comedy moments, even a few really good dramatic moments. It's the kind of show that doesn't mind switching styles to set up a joke and it throws out all sorts of wild characters just because. It also managed to avoid the Saturday morning preachiness that it seemed like it was heading towards after the first episode.

So, yeah, go watch it if you like funny stuff that's not offensive.

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Softenni 10 - Worst episode of the series yet? The first part of this series is centered around a tasteless joke, and then the next part is moronic and insulting. Great. Too bad, this show had been pretty funny for a while.

For some details, the first part introduces a new girl who joins the team. She can see ghosts. Two years ago, her sister died on the way to a soft tennis match when she was hit by a car; her sister here was watching at the time. Um, that's by far the most serious thing mentioned in this show so far. That's not the bad part, though... that came next, when she said, apparently seriously, that at the time she thought that the tennis ball her sister was carrying would protect her from the oncoming truck, only to realize a moment later that it was too small, so her sister was killed.

WHAT? Who in the world thought that that was an appropriate joke to make... that's just wrong.

So, then they get her to join the team. Oh, the search for new members (they want a 6th so they can have three doubles pairs) was kind of amusing, they wear quite gaudy costumes and then run around chasing down everyone they can think of. The scene got old by the end of it, though. This just isn't a good episode. The characters then learn that the new girl's sister's ghost hasn't passed on and instead is in this girl's body, and occasionally possesses it. Her sister is very good at soft tennis and is very competitive, making her quite unlike the shy girl she normally is; when possessed her hair and teeth turn spiky. Yeah, kind of stupid but maybe amusing.

Then, the team learns that they have to pass their tests or they can't participate in matches, right after we are reminded that two of them are idiots who hate studying -- our MC got a 15 on her most recent test for instance, and one of the other girls gives a speech about how she only goes to school for the clubs and hates classes and studying. Um, great priorities there. But because they have to pass, the team decides to hold a study session... at the coach's apartment. Um, yeah.

Once there, the idiocy kicks into full gear again as, as soon as they see that the place is a mess, the girls all decide to clean it up for him. Most of the rest of the episode is taken up with this stupid and lame scene. As if people would actually do that? Yeah right. And it's not very funny either.

Then, they finally get around to studying. Yeah, trying to cram all of it the night before... good luck there. This is the best part of the episode, but it's still not above average. Somehow the two in trouble manage to pass... the powers of fiction helped them perhaps? :)

So yeah, overall, probably the worst episode of the series yet.

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Nichijou 11 - How is Yukko ever, ever going to graduate high school if she keeps completely failing tests like this? At some point she'll have to start trying, or she'll flunk out or something...

But apart from the segments about how awful Yukko is at school and studying, there was more stuff in this episode about other characters. The Professor/Nano/Sakamoto part was amusing, involving them all getting stuck in a giant pool of glue thanks to the Professor. There were other segments too, like one about an old man complaining about how bad and pathetic his life was. I'm not sure if it was supposed to be funny or sad, but it was both.

Sailor Moon R 57-64 - So formulaic, that was too many episodes at once... it starts to get a bit dull after the sixth or so straight episode.

In 57-59, the first arc of R ends. Finally. The two aliens learn what love, feelings, and compassion are. We learn that the Doom Tree actually isn't evil at all, it just wanted love -- but its creations, the green aliens, had forgotten love and only knew violence. Its efforts to show them that they were wrong had failed, but Usagi and Mamoru's love shows them what it's really like and helps show them how they should be. And then the tree starts talking and explains it all... um, why not just do that sooner? Kind of silly.

But in the end all of their numerous crimes are completely forgotten (never mentioned in the last few episodes, in fact) and the sailor scouts let them fly off into space, together, as a twincestual couple. Yeah, they're twins. Great, anime must be anime I guess.

Then, in ep. 60, the next arc starts, against Dark Moon or whatever their name is, and Chibi-Usa appears. She's both stupid and annoying, her whole story arc is so contrived (just tell them why you're there and it'd all get better! But no, of course she explains nothing so that this can go on and on and on...) and she's such a mean, manipulative child. Working to turn Usagi's friends against her, trying to steal the jewel, conning Mamoru into breaking up with her... lots of reasons to hate her, it's easy to see why she's so extremely unpopular.

Also these new villains are just like all the other villains in this show -- borderline incompetent and always somehow convinced that this NEXT youma/cardian/golem/whatever is of COURSE going to do the trick! Never mind the dozens of failures before it! Yeah, the more of this you watch at once the more obviously silly the formula becomes. Oh well, it's not that bad, and some of the episodes were good.

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Anohana ending - Aww... so sad... :( Poor Menma... :(

Iria 05-06 - It's really too bad that this is such a short series, it's pretty good. I wish it had continued (I know there's also a movie, and I want to see that, but beyond that I mean)> There's plenty of room for a continuation, and Iria is a great character so it'd be cool to see more with her in it.

(On that note, she was MIA for way too long in ep. 5, why wait so long in that battle before showing up? Should have come out to fight sooner. Oh well.)

Street Fighter II V 20-22 - Coming towards a climax I guess... Ryu's sort of brainwashed, Chun Li needs to be rescued... I wonder, can Ken do both? I expect Ryu to break free of the mind control and make up for losing the first time by beating Bison or something along those lines, unless Ken has to rescue him before that happens.

SFIIV 23-25 - The show trudges towards its drawn out conclusion... man, is this show boring. For a fighting show there sure isn't much fighting, and there's far too much tedium and Ryu charging his power. A little does happen here -- Ken escapes with a Shoryuken, and now is fighting mind-controlled Ryu, Chun-Li is also mind controlled and is in a costume that looks sort of like her classic one, Fei Long and Cammy are fighting (because she still believes Balrog isn't evil and is following his orders), Guile is fighting Zangief -- but that makes it sound a lot more exciting than it is...

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[Dark Jaguar]

Didn't think Sailor Moon would get mentioned here again, at least not on purpose. Yeah when I was younger I remember the whole "hero team made of unpopular teens" and liked how it worked. It didn't come across as patronizing as the other power rangers did to Billy a lot of the time, that's for sure.

As for "when", well I've kinda given up on that in anime spinoff movies. None of them ever seem to fit anywhere, with the one exception being the Pokemon movies. If you want big offenders, look at those Dragon Ball movies. Just about all of them are stuck in places that are simply impossible due to just how constantly busy Goku always was fighting one thing or another (or busy being dead, or recovering) in the series.

[A Black Falcon]

Didn't think Sailor Moon would get mentioned here again, at least not on purpose. Yeah when I was younger I remember the whole "hero team made of unpopular teens" and liked how it worked. It didn't come across as patronizing as the other power rangers did to Billy a lot of the time, that's for sure.

There are a couple of reasons I'm watching it. First, some people from the GAF anime thread (who also have started an IRC chatroom I'm in sometimes) stream some anime online sometimes. They decided to show Sailor Moon, so I started watching some. As you can see if you count the episode numbers I've posted I missed several dozen episodes (after three or four hours I start to lose interest...), but still it is kind of interesting because it's not a show I've seen before; while I did see the last season, Sailor Stars, in anime club in college, I've never seen the first four seasons of the show before. I didn't watch anime in the '90s remember, and this wasn't something I'd gone back and watched. It's silly, but entertaining enough that I keep watching, and don't really mind it either... I can't help but be entertained whether or not I wanted to be. :)

Oh -- we are watching it subbed, not dubbed. It's so much better in Japanese... On that note though, and I'm not sure if I mentioned it, but Street Fighter II V is another thing I watched there, and that we watched dubbed. I think it made it more entertaining, versus the subbed version. That dub was pretty amusing at times. :)

As for "when", well I've kinda given up on that in anime spinoff movies. None of them ever seem to fit anywhere, with the one exception being the Pokemon movies. If you want big offenders, look at those Dragon Ball movies. Just about all of them are stuck in places that are simply impossible due to just how constantly busy Goku always was fighting one thing or another (or busy being dead, or recovering) in the series.

I don't know the details about Dragon Ball (that's not a series I've ever watched, or wanted to watch), but yeah, that is true I guess... they just make the movies, whether or not they fit in continuity. At least sometimes the movie is clearly in an alternate reality, like the Escaflowne movie which tells a completely different version of the story... but in cases like this, where it seems to be set there but it's pretty hard to figure out when it could have happened, it is annoying. I know I should just ignore it, but it is kind of annoying.

Hidan no Aria 11 - Is this almost over? I guess there's one major confrontation that's about to happen, anyway, in the coming Riko v. Aria/MC fight. As for this episode though, in this ep our stupid heroes believe Riko and go get a necklace that a teacher at the academy, who works as a researcher for one Vlad of Romania (who just happens to have a mansion in Yokohama), stole. I said last episode about how stupid it was they actually trusted her, and of course as I said above they were proven to have been foolish.

Still though, Riko is entertaining, so I don't mind TOO much... she's funnier than either of the main characters. :)

Oh, and of course in order to infiltrate the mansion and steal back the necklace, Aria and the MC take on the roles as his temporary servants, so he dresses up as a butler and Aria as a maid, with the usual anime frilly maid clothing. Cue Aria-as-maid fanservice. No pantyshots though, just some almost-pantyshot shots of her dress flutterin. What are they trying, "is she wearing underwear" again? I think they did that in ep. 1, but then they followed that one up with a bra-and-panty shot that isn't in this one. Whatever.

... Yeah, this episode was as much about fanservice as it was about anything else... also though, we do learn that our hero has some touchy spots he doesn't want to talk about, such as the girl who Riko disguises herself as (Aria asks who she is but he won't answer her). And also, Riko can be amusing. :)

[A Black Falcon]

Hidan no Aria 12 - Huh, why did 11 and 12 both release on the same day? Whatever. So, it's over. After skipping episode 11, for ep. 12 gg provided us with a final trollsub extravaganza, this time dubbing the whole episode with computer voices reading the script. Good work, gg, you gave this show the attention and care it deserves. :)

As for the episode, it was entertaining. Too bad it's over now and there might not be a second season, because the show's definitely gotten more entertaining as it's gone along and even though it's extremely generic and unbelievably stupid, Aria is stupidly funny enough to be funny enough of the time to keep me watching. It's really, really stupid, and is quite bad by any measure, but it's funny bad and this episode was as amusing as any of them.

So the episode starts with Aria and Kinji's fight with Riko. It ends quickly though, as the final boss of this season (and the show if it doesn't get a continuation) appears, that teacher from ep. 11, except now revealed as a vampire himself. He may actually be Dracula, I'm not entirely sure. Apparently in this show, vampires can turn into werewolves. Um, I thought vampires and werewolves hated eachother... apparently not here. Huh. So, they fight the super strong and tough werewolf Dracula. He insults and beats up on Riko (insulting her, stepping on her face, etc.), while the other two just watch until Riko finally asks for their help. That's cruel, but she was cruel to them sometimes too and they did help eventually.

As for the fight, it was a tough one, but of course in the end they manage to win. Riko spends almost half of the episode just in her underwear because at one point she uses her clothing parachute in order to save Kinji and Aria. Then they con Were-Drac and kill him... clever. And then, to finish things off, Aria and Riko both prove their tsundere credentials by using some classic tsun lines. Oh anime...