Anime Thread - 2012

[A Black Falcon]

Unless the entire concept and beginning of the manga are all compete lies, I doubt that...


Senran Kagura 4-5 - Senran Kagura is great! I like it a lot. Best show of this kind in a while. The only real bad thing about it is that there's a week between episodes. :)


Saki Achiga-hen: Episode of Side-A 12 (last TV ep) and 13-14 (OVA eps 1-2) - Looking back to summer last year I made a few posts talking about what happens in ep. 12 of Saki Achiga-hen, but I failed to write up a review of that episode, which is the last episode of the original Achiga-hen run. But yeah, it was a great conclusion to the first match of the Side-A final. The action's heated, and Teru very impressively good (and scary). Poor Kuro... she finally managed to stop her streak at the end, but before that she, Toki, and the Shindouji girl all lost so, so many points. But I mostly wrote this for the two new episodes (from 2013), 13 and 14.

Saki Achiga-hen episodes 13-14 - These two episodes, the first two (monthly) episodes of what is now going to be four OVA episodes, go through the remaining four rounds of the match, at a pace of about one round per episode. This results in a sadly somewhat rushed pace again, but still, they're great episodes, as expected. These two cover rounds 2 and 3 of the match, and part of round 4. It's currently Arata's match then, though this episode doesn't really get to her much; it's mostly the other players, all trying to one-up eachother. Shindouji is mounting a VERY impressive comeback -- they fell very, very far behind by the end of round 3 ("it's all the government's fault", huh, round 3 sheep-hair girl? I think not. :) ), but their last two players are much better, and also of course are a Saki-style "yuri couple". These two have a bond (and some light bondage themes), so the first can set keys, and the second can get powered up in the rounds that the first set and then won in, or powered down in rounds where the first sets a key but then fails to win. The final round is sure to be exciting... I expect the results to be the expected ones, but Ritz has done a good job of making it exciting and bringing all four teams into legitimate contention near the end!

Oh yeah, and as for the third round, Sera/Ako... Good stuff there! Also, poor "fisher king" girl from Shiraitodai... she was supposed to be good, but got crushed, badly. The announcers were too kind...

There is a frequent complaint about Achiga-hen that I see that the actual Achiga girls don't get enough characterization. And generally, this is true; even the main character, Shizu, is mostly unknown, as far as her Mahjong playing style is concerned at least. Why is even Amae Koromo worried about how good she will be? It's this far into the series, and we still have no idea! This continues until the final chapter of the Achiga manga, where her powers are finally explained; expect that in anime ep. 16. It's a late reveal, but at least she has a good power. And we only learned more details about Arata's playstyle this episode. I know that she has the least amount of attention of the five main characters, but still... I wish that this series was longer, so there was more time to establish the main cast. As it is, as much or more time has been spent on some girls from other schools, most obviously Toki and Ryuuka, but also Teru, Awai, and the two bondage lesbians from Shindouji too. Of course having significant characterization for characters from every major team is a series staple and is to be expected, but at least in the main series the main characters have as much or more. In this series, the main character is the one that we might know the least about, powers-wise! I mean, it's sure to be interesting once we finally learn, but it does make it hard to avoid charges of it being contrived, when the series starts out with three of the five main characters not seeming to have any special abilities, and the other two only seeming to have average ones. I know that they have a great coach, who's able to see things in the other players that even the other coaches seem to miss, and that obviously helps, but it would be nice if it were a little clearer why Achiga actually deserves to be here, for reasons other than "because they need to for the story". Some of that's here, such as the hints about how good Shizu is, but is it enough? Debatable.

Despite that though, these are two great episodes. Saki's at its best when it's in intense mahjong action interspersed with yuri, and this match has both of those in spades. (And as for nopan, Saki's other distinguishing mark... uh, Hajime's summer costume makes an appearance in this episode. Enough said.) So yeah, great episodes, as expected! I'm very much looking forward to the last two. And Arata's cool.


Images, ep. 13:

Yuu dodges incoming fire!

And then strikes back, because she does great in this match.

Afterwards, Ako tries to get some of Yuu's luck to rub off on her...

Too bad, you're kidding?

Yuu would like it if that were your reason. She likes warmth.

Ep. 14:

http://www.abload.de/img/vlcsnap-2013-01-31-035pdbq.jpg
Hajime and Amae Koromo visit, and wake up, Saki on the morning of Achiga's match. Probably NSFW; that outfit of Hajime's probably should be linked only, not posted.

Shindouji's keymaking bondage lesbian girl has some cool animations when she does a good enough hit to get a key...

And there one is. After the above the sky goes blue, then this descends down. Sometimes huge keys are shown, but this one is small, and, well, key-sized. The last Shindouji girl can use the keys on the rounds they were gotten in, to get good combos that turn.

Go, Arata!