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animekink wrote:

Just began to watch Naruto.
Why? A good friends told me that I must.
In anime fan world it's like not watching The Godfather for movie fans.
.p.s...I'm new to anime Embarassed

1st of all: Welcome to the ANN forums.
2nd of all: If you're going to watch Naruto, then I suggest that that you Identify and skip the filler episodes. Just my 2 cents.

So over the past couple of hours I started watching the currently airing Please Talk! Galko-chan. Why? Because /a/ and /m/ will not stop talking about this and it get more threads than anything else airing in the former while the latter constantly brings it up more than, say, Active Raid. So this is slice of life school comedy with 8 minute episodes. Aside from pacing nothing about this is so much as decent (writing, music, humor, animation, forced ecchi garbage, lack of focus, and the titular character being obnoxious). There is not much other to say for a series like this; then I noticed THIS in the end credits and reacted promptly:

http://i.imgur.com/AohY5el.jpg

Well that explains how nearly all my pet peeves can be thrown into a single TV series, gotta give credit to Gainax I do not bring up "does not have the opening theme in the first episode" that often.

Just.... Why is this talked about so much? Like, seriously, why? There is nothing to these jokes (which barely go over a minute in length) and yet single shots get entire discussion boards about them. Is there a giant amount of depth here and nobody is telling me? Why is /m/ going gaga over what is a three second CCA parody? Did literature professors take over 4chan? Why is this the most popular anime of the season? Granted, aside from Ajin (and Active Raid to a lesser degree) nothing particularly interests me this season, but still! Is there a colossal amount of porn being produced over this? How is this even meme material? If this is meme material clearly I have gotten so old I might as well start acting like I voted for John F Kennedy! Was there a need on girly humor and this uncovered a niche normally ignored?

^ It's got cute (and of varied fetishes) girls talking obscenity.
That's pretty much enough to get famous. I don't think there's too much porn of it (yet, at least).

Today I finally FINALLY finished From the New World, an anime that I began watching when it was airing but stopped, tried to marathon it a year later but stopped again. Been planning to marathon it all the way through for maybe 2 years at this point but just never found the time.

Now I've seen it, it was great, I feel so good, and now I wish I could read the original novel because it is such a fascinating story. Perhaps I could read the manga in the meantime.

^ The novel is being fan translated, if you're not against those. Do note that the manga is quite different in tone to the anime, though the main content is still there.

Stuff I finally finished:

-Takegami: Final battle aside it maintained the boringness of the previous episode and had a bunch of exposition that was kind of hard to take in all at once. It could have used a more detailed ending, but the horror elements were still present and I have to admit the music was somewhat solid and fitting even if I didn't care for it. It manages to be on the lower end of mediocrity.

-Mutant Ninja Turtles: So they ditched the toku referencing for mystical armor.... And it doesn't really have an ending.... This feels like the middle portion of a bigger story, the lack of a proper beginning and ending makes this feel very incomplete, but still entertaining enough to call it great.

-Blood Reign: More actiony than the first episode/half/portion of the story while keeping with the horror elements and high quality designs. Even the ending has an unsettling yet inconclusive feel done correctly. This is called a bad anime? It is nothing of the sort, quite excellent if anything. Cool

-Gun Smith Cats: It ended like an action movie, I liked it a bunch! It was basically action packed awesomeness like Mad Bull 34 except they cut sex junk out of it and was all-'murican. One of the best OVAs I have ever seen. Cool

-Gargantia: Far Beyond The Voyage: The first half of the other episode was pointless fanservice garbage despite the plot being about activating an ancient robot similar to Chamber. The action scenes and art were still good, but it only reaches the higher end of mediocrity due to how much pointless filler and slow pacing infected it and that isn't going into the horrid music or how useless Amy was.

-Jungle De Ikou: Technically finished this earlier today. So what happened that Anime Abandon was not brave enough to show? Simple, Ongo became a kaiju, Mei grew to giant size (the pervy photographers were actually funny), the squirting dance was back, but still brief (possibly shorter), and.... Wait, hugging won the day despite how inconsiderate Mii acted? Kind of poor build up on top of a forced message on how archaeology is about the present (it is dumb). Also Rongo's host didn't die despite what should have been a snapped spine, go figure. So this was.... I won't lie, this was kind of good, it is one of the few raunchy anime comedies that actually made me laugh AND it wasn't done by Go Nagai or Masami Obari (which is saying a lot). Not surprising, Anime Abandon called Bounty Dog a bad anime despite it being good too, so I guess every review needs a pound of salt. Laughing

Yesterday I finished Kids on the Slope. Shows of this character seldom gravitate towards me, but it was freely available on Crunchyroll, and the combination of Shinichiro Watanabe and Yoko Kanno sufficed to pique my curiosity.

From the outset it quickly establishes its strongest element: the unlikely friendship of the high attaining fish-out-of-water Kaoru and the aloof but multifaceted delinquent Sentaro. In the first episode their contrasting body language and gaze is superbly telling, conjuring what can only be described as a profound and—dare I say—notably sexual energy between them. I doubt I shall see a more complex relationship developing within a single anime episode at any time soon.

This momentum does not last. Respective love interests for Sentaro and Kaoru are hastily introduced, and emotions between the cast members soon simmer in rather hackneyed ways. Spoken interactions and monologues reveal nothing that expressions or gestures do not, characters make a habit of suddenly running away from each other through anger or anguish with too high a frequency to leave any impact, and the female leads themselves are often denied their own voices or motives, seemingly existing only to send and receive the standard array of strained and conflicted amorous feelings with the two males. It is not that these dramatic apparatuses common to anime romances have no place here, just that their often mistimed and underwhelming deployment seem only to exist as a diversion from the show’s central friendship.

Fortunately, though indeed predictably, this friendship endures throughout and leads to a satisfying conclusion, though by the time of the finale one is left questioning the extent to which the romantic subplots contributed anything to the screenplay beyond a number of twists sufficient to fill twelve episodes.

Is the series uplifted by its presentation? Certainly, but only to an extent. There is an eloquence to the show that the script betrays, making the plot’s failings all the more frustrating. The frequent jazz sessions involving Sentaro and Kaoru grant them a medium of communication that excels far beyond their verbal exchanges. Musical nuances teem abundantly, and the voices they find in their instruments of choice, when combined with the body language exuded as they play them, constitute all of the best arranged and most affecting scenes. All of which, thankfully, occur without so much as a word being spoken. Sadly, despite Yako Kanno’s involvement, the opening, ending and incidental music is largely forgettable vis-à-vis the masterful use of jazz.

Kids on the Slope starts wonderfully and includes applaudable set pieces and a genuinely appealing central relationship, but the mediocrity of the script simply betrays the music, like an uninspired libretto buoyed by a composer’s superior score. I cannot help but favourably recall Watanabe’s short film Baby Blue, which managed to be far more affecting in a comparatively minuscule running time. Kids on the Slope is a song that rewards you for listening to it, but only if one ignores the humdrum lyrics to relish the occasional moment of complexity arising from its melodies.

Long post about lots of 80's sci fi:

Black Magic M66- A short, decent action piece. The story and characters are pretty barebones so don't expect much in that department. There's some nicely animated fight scenes, the movements of the android assassins in particular are pretty neat and there's lots of little animated details in the background. This short OVA also has the distinction of being the only anime that Masamune Shirow wrote and somewhat directed, (Hiroyuki Kitakubo apparently took over the directing duties during production). Too bad his experience was so bad that Shirow never worked in anime again. Also, the M in the title stands for Mario, lol.

Royal Space Force: The Wings of Honneamise- classic work from Gainax in it's prime during the 80s and 90s. Honneamise was actually a lot different from what I expected. I went in expecting a sci-fi epic but it's really more of a character study or character drama around the lead, Shirotsugh. It's a beautiful looking film with an incredible amount of detail in nearly every scene and great character animation. It's a well written movie and since it's focused on Shirotsugh you really get to see his character growth by the end of the movie. Of course, I do have to mention the infamous scene that bothered a lot of people. I felt the scene was out of place but it didn't ruin the movie for me. In any case, I'm looking forward to Uru in Blue, whenever it comes out.

Dragon's Heaven- an obscure OVA from Makoto Kobayashi, a mechanical designer best known for his mecha designs in Zeta Gundam, Gundam ZZ, Last Exile and Venus Wars (more below). He also did ICE, which I haven't seen but have heard many bad things about. Anyway, Dragon's Heaven is a neat little OVA with a great artstyle and some very imaginative mecha designs. The art style looks a lot like Moebius's art, especially the black specks in the backgrounds.

The background art for the cities and the buildings really look like alien structures from the distant future. The mecha designs, especially for the two lead mecha have this gritty, organic look that make the mecha look like a combination of creature and machine. The one downside to the artstyle is that it's difficult to animate unless you have a big budget, so unfortunately the animation comes off as a little stiff. The story and characters are barely there for the most part, but you're watching this for the visuals anyway.

The Five Star Stories- Surprisingly dull movie adaptation of the early chapters of the manga. The character and mecha designs are beautiful, especially the latter. Mamoru Nagano's mecha designs look more like art sculptures than machines of war. The characters are very lanky looking, in fact, I kept thinking somebody had stretched out everyone's faces and limbs. Unfortunately, I feel the director and writer made a bad decision to focus on political intrigue.

Since the movie itself is barely over an hour, it feels sorta pointless to build up all this political intrigue that never gets resolved. There really isn't much action either. In fact, there's only one brief mecha battle at the very end. The characters are pretty flat. I hate to say it, but this movie really felt like an advertisement for the manga as opposed to something that can stand on it's own.

Venus Wars- One of my favorite anime movies of all time, Venus Wars is a great watch. Personally, it's my favorite of Yasuhiko's animated work. I've seen some harsh reviews of Venus Wars so I'll do a quick defense here. Some complain about this story being shallow and mediocre. For me, the story has a simple focus on a group of friends. I don't think the writers were going for any social commentary or deep character development. Another complaint is that characters are unlikeable. Ironically, I think that's part of the appeal of the cast. The main character is basically an anti-establishment biker punk (like Kaneda in Akira), a character type which was really popular back in the 80's, and I think it's refreshing compared to many of the generic nice guys or cocky geniuses we get nowadays.

But it's really for the fantastic animation and atmosphere that makes Venus Wars fun to watch. Yas was in his prime here, as this movie is packed with gritty, epic action sequences. It also helps that Makoto Kobayashi supplied one of the coolest designs ever, the monobike. These one-wheeled motorcyles are some of the most memorable designs in all of anime, IMO and the massive octotanks look great as well. Venus Wars must;ve had a huge budget because the animation quality is almost up there with Akira. Yas is a master animator and with a big budget here, he turns out some fantastic action sequences. Seriously, the animation is very fluid, something you only get in really high budget productions. The massive octotanks have some super fluid animation for the treads and turrets and every destroyed building or piece of scenery kicks up detailed clouds of smoke, dust, and debris.

I really character designs as well. Yas is unique in that his character designs really haven't changed much since the 70's and 80's so his characters have this timeless look to them. It's really a shame that Yasuhiko basically disowned this movie, since I would've loved to see him adapt the rest of manga like he's doing for the Gundam Origin OVAs.

DuelGundam2099 wrote:

-Mutant Ninja Turtles:

That's a manga now ?

Last edited by Ammonite on Thu Aug 04, 2016 8:44 am; edited 1 time in total

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Skip Beat! - I heard about this anime during the latest ANN podcast. So, I checked it out. I'm really loving the story. I find my self laughing out loud a lot.

MSG IBO - I've been watching from the start and I know the finale is due this weekend. I've always liked all the Gundam series.

Erased - What can I say about this one. Absolutely the best anime this season. I know there are others not happy with the deviation from the manga but that won't change how I feel about this series.

Active Raid - Good action anime. I like the concept of the willwear.

Konosuba - as a D&D player for me this series totally hit the mark. I started reading the manga since they only did 10 episodes this season. I hope CR streams season 2.

Ojisan and Marshmallow - nice short episodes with tons of laughs.

Please tell me! Galko-chan - This show is just Hilarious!

BBK/BRNK - Great team fighting anime. I hope they go more into the origin of the buranki.

I'm watching some other new series along with some older ones.

Well happy viewing to everyone!

The gf and I just marathoned through season 1 of Akame ga Kill. It was a nice fun action packed show. A perfect way to enjoy some down time without having to think too hard. Got part 2 on pre-order already from Right Stuf. I think we're going to continue the mood with another action packed show. I'm thinking Tokyo Ghoul. To offset the uber violence we're going to watch another show. I think she wants to watch Karneval next.

Last week I finally watched Mamoru Hosoda’s Wolf Children. Somehow I expected I would cross paths with this film eventually. Like The Girl Who Leapt Through Time we are invited into the world of a young woman and the trials she faces once acquainted with a man of unknown provenance, but similarities in content are otherwise few. We are offered not a film that explores the consequences of personal desire as such, but those of a simple but curtailed love that manifests into the delicate but often gruelling form of single motherhood.

There is nothing thematically intense to this film, and as such I cannot call Hosoda’s work a study in parenthood or indeed in anything else, though one can nonetheless identify three arcs through which different themes integral to parenting are given cinematic expression.

The first of these is how the film’s eponymous characters come to be. A distanced, montage-laden introduction shows our student heroine Hana becoming joyously enamoured by a dishevelled wolf-man. The element of fantasy at play comes not from his supernatural nature but rather the carefully orchestrated beauty by which the otherwise unassuming couple become lovers and parents, their dialogue often being muted so as to allow the camera to convey their passion without this focus being offset by any of the melodramatic outbursts that are both typical and detrimental to anime romances.

The sudden but thoughtfully presented death of the wolf-man ushers the second arc, in which Hana copes with how to physically sustain her children. A familiar bucolic setting belies the tests of strength that come to dominate this section, in which Hana’s unyielding selflessness prevails over her lack of farming experience. By virtue of its content, this chapter is less arresting than the straightforward tragedy it follows, though it culminates with an astounding scene in which Hana and her lupine children hurtle in delight down a snow-topped peak, a climactic reward for her toils that is a treat to behold. Its stark, minimal sky-blue palette and flowing movement are as breathtaking as any action sequence one could wish for.

Another dramatic turn beckons the third and final act, in which Yuki and Ame begin to grow up and assert their individuality. spoiler[Having been rescued from drowning while learning to hunt], Ame grows attached to the world of the forest whereas his elder sister Yuki gravitates towards her school life. By symbolically assigning each of the wolf children a respective lupine and human role, Hosoda treads the familiar territory of the relationship between humans and their wilderness. This divide is shown most harrowingly in a vicious fight between the two children that is commendably presented in all its rawness, but sadly this rift between the characters is left without a conciliatory coda. It thus becomes only fitting that there is one climax for each of the child characters. spoiler[Yuki, the human, finally admits her dual form to a school admirer, thereby coming to terms with her place amongst other people, whereas Ame, the wolf, turns his back on mankind but rescues his mother as a parting gift. The sheer emotional peak attained by the former scene comparatively mars the latter one. Whereas Yuki's conflict is accepted in a delicate but impassioned display of forgiveness and care, Ame merely howls in animalistic triumph from atop a crevice—complete with a sweeping orchestral crescendo—before a clichéd sunrise. We are invited to celebrate each event, as Hana does, though the comparative difficulty we encounter in sympathising with someone losing rather than embracing his humanity may betray how Hosoda wished for us to view wolves in general.]

A broader criticism Wolf Children faces is the fact that Hana is seen only to have others' interests in mind, and denied a plight as a self-standing woman with goals independent of her family. Such an absence will limit the film's appeal, though to expound upon Hana's character to a sufficient degree to address this issue would be to expand the scope of the film beyond that within which it manages to function, an endeavour that might have offset its central element. In any case, we can still tell that Hana acts through an independent and self-arising desire. Up to the film's very end it is apparent that her sacrifices to her children were an extended gesture of the love she wholeheartedly chose.

It should be granted that the film’s lacunas are only noticed on reflection. In the moment of the unfolding screenplay they are lost in Hosoda's seemingly veteran direction, rivalling the best one can expect from the oeuvres of Ghibli or Makoto Shinkai, to which parallels with this work may be drawn. The rich presentation is simply marvellous and the soundtrack’s main theme is near sublime. What would have been a merely pleasant story about love, loss and childhood is turned profoundly moving under Hosoda’s abounding artistry and presentational detail. For the first time in a long while I sobbed throughout the credits.

Despite its formal imperfections and lack of narrative complexity, Wolf Children still managed to be the most superbly emotional film I have seen since Shinkai’s Five Centimetres Per Second. If this tale does not prove to be Hosoda’s strongest contribution to anime, it will take something unprecedented from him to surpass it.

Zin5ki wrote:

The sudden but thoughtfully presented death of the wolf-man ushers the second arc [...].

Of course, opinions and entertainment go hand-in-hand; but I, personally, thought that that the death was a stupid one -- even it if was necessary for the development of the story.

Forced myself to finish Phantom- Requiem for the Phantom

I thought Gen Urobuchi could be trusted more, but no. It's Crap. It's almost as bad as Noir.

Sure, these sorts of nihilistic shoot-em-ups generally aren't my thing in the first place but even if such a show is up your alley i just don't see how you can forgive the wild logic, motive, and even action-style changes.

The plots by the warring factions are clumsier than a guy on crutches trying to get across an icy parking lot. Every one is reliant on the kingpin, pirate fancy-pants, believing the first thing he hears and acting according to that. Really, for a "criminal mastermind", he's a blithering idiot who keeps letting everyone go crazy with plan after plan that can destroy their stability and power structure while he laughs away and revels in a grasp of power that makes no sense.

As for motives and character shifting, Cal/Drei is the most obvious, but I think the relationship between Claudia and Lizzie makes the least sense- a bodyguard that would apparently do absolutely anything for her one boss and the boss who should know the absolute trust she puts in her NEVER sharing her plans.

And then there's the weird little details. How blood stopped showing up when people got shot. How the story seems to span at least five years and our main characters are still able to pose as high school students in the final section. how it was absolutely impossible to tell even the most general ethnicity unless they're black (Until the final part I had no idea Eren was supposed to be Asian at all and in the end she was Mongolian???) but the worst was how, in the beginning, gun fire meant danger- anyone could be shot by anyone- then characters became selectively bad aims- and finally, if you were a Phantom, you could jump into a barrage of automatic machine gun fire from a army of underlings- no matter how confined the space- and not be scratched.

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