Forum - View topicWhat are you watching right now? Why? (please read 1st post)
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TsunaReborn!
 Posts: 4713 Location: Cheltenham UK |
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^^^ ha I love that scene in the Mist, its one of the few deaths that has made me feel some kind of relief as anyone who has the means to make a good cult leader needs to be put in thier place.
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Crisha
Moderator
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YAAAAAY, Hate Sink! (Speaking of which, did you know TVTropes had a Kickstarter? And that it reached its goal of $50,000? I just found out myself).
Blood-C and School Days sound like series I'd want to have Kill 'Em All, Tomino endings. THIS IS FOR ALL THOSE HOURS OF TORTURE YOU PUT ME THROUGH YOU *******! MWAHAHAHA. Oh, right, what am I watching? Eh... stuff. I'm mostly up-to-date with Yona of the Dawn and Chaika. And I've fallen a bit behind on Parasyte and Mushishi though I do tend to correct that soon. All great series! One series I had previously written off but am now intrigued to watch is Yuki Yuna wa Yusha. I started reading the reviews by Theron, and the series is way different than I expected. |
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DuelGundam2099
 Posts: 533 |
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Things I finished recently:
-Ground Defense Force Mao-chan: Eh, I found it good, even if it slowly waned off its charm over time and the ending was nothing special, you have to like the idea of baby animals being monsters of the week. Normally I barely find magic girl series decent with few exceptions.... And this is one of them! Not by much, but enough. -Afro Samurai Resurrection: It was a very satisfying conclusion and continuation of the original television series, the animation and audio were as top notch as always, the writing and characters were still solid, and the change in theme was extremely fitting that dealt with the aftermath of so much violence. This franchise really is a bit of a buried treasure. -Blood Plus: Watched because I remember seeing the lackluster ova and the surprisingly good live action adaption. Very solid almost everything including the monsters, the art, the atmosphere, the pacing, the cast, the setting, and even the ending ended on a good note. I even liked the mystery aspects that went on through most of the series. In fact I like protags enough that I actually consider Red Shield (their name) as the third best protagonist team only after the Dagwon Team (Brave Command Dagwon) and DEAVA (Genesis of Aquarion). I have no idea why, but this series reminds me of Escaflowne, I don't know, maybe because Saya reminds me of Hitomi or something. The only thing bringing this down was the music, so mediocre and often so very unfitting; if not for that this could have made my top 15 easy. -Layzner OVA trilogy: The reasoning behind watching this was due to after episode 23 I saw the rest of the series in raws and the third OVA has a more drawn out ending than the TV version because of early cancellation. First OVA cut out Gostero for no reason, but it also took away a lot of the slow pacing that plagued the first quarter of the series. It also cut out that neat two parter with the skull police- No, wait, "skall" police (honestly, Sunrise?). The second OVA merely confirmed a few suspicions I had when I watched it raw. Third OVA I am glad they made, it was a lot better executed than the final two episodes complete with a solid final battle. The saddest part is that after seeing so many anime and toku over the years I can safely say very few battle OST insert tracks come anywhere near as good as the V-Max theme. 
-Sacred Seven: Likeable series, although I don't think it knew what type of series it tried to be. Episodes 1 to 5 and 9 acted like a MOTW series, 6, 7, 11, and 12 acted like a serious conspiracy sci-fi story, and 8 and 10 were more or less slice of life romance.... Yeah, this might have mixed fine if they chopped down some elements and spread them around the series more. The music and side characters are nothing special although the art style, darkstones, and writing were good. The weirdest part of this? Minus having no payoff the romance is actually done surprisingly well. I know this was aimed for kids, but still. -Najica Blitz Tactics: I go more in-depth than usual and I am not sure what exactly qualifies as spoilers so after the initial opening I'll just cover the next two paragraphs in spoilers. Keep in mind I usually find ecchi in excess as dumb (unless it serves a legit story point/I find it funny). Directed by the same guy that did the first two entries in the Agent Aika trilogy (and it shows) and Blazing Transfer Student (a 90s Gainax ova I actually enjoyed, no bounce in that somehow). This review looks negative, but I promise it'll end up being positive. With that said.... spoiler[I have never seen a TV anime with such a poorly fleshed out setting. Supposedly post-apocalyptic with some flooded waters and cities in ruins, but we get zero back story on this whatsoever. You can't even say just war alone because of natural disasters and whatnot (although that does explain why there were at least two laser cannon satellites). When your merchandise gives more details to something like that, you done flunked. Very hard. They could have at least made a few still shots and had a 15-20 second narration. Lets ignore the gratuitous panty shots all over the place and the fact that the first episode had the main heroine's sidekick nearly raped. The music, not counting the ending theme, was incredibly generic and not in a good way. The ending theme itself was just okay. The comedy was so poor and forced it is no wonder they dropped using much after episode 4. Then there is basic motivation: Why the hell would a perfume company (with spies I may add) want to retrieve rogue cyborgs? I don't even see the connection in that and they didn't even bother to explain it. Even the mad doctor never bothered to give her motive.  Did I mention guns can be pulled out from nowhere even when there is nowhere they could have been placed? Did I also mention these rogue cyborgs also have sonic scream powers they never bother using most of the time? Well I mentioned them now. The animation ranges from decent to cheap (not surprised since this was only 12 episodes), but otherwise not bad. Then there is the audio other than the music: The first two episodes don't even use more than one sound effect or dialogue sequence at a time; you'd think this wouldn't be an issue, but when spy-oriented action is the main theme of your movie you'd expect this would be done right. This isn't even one of those times you can blame the dub on since I saw the subbed version of this (because the dubbed version was not on the site I watched this one; on side note why the hell was this listed as shonen? Because it certainly was not). On top of all that the pacing is kind of poor for the first quarter of the series.
Then episode 5 comes along and suddenly they start to fix their issues. The animation got more consistent, the audio got better, inconsistencies lessened (although how Najica can summon her main outfit from nowhere is very odd), no dumb jokes were present, the fan service slowly gave small bits of restraint, and none of the cast did anything annoying. In addition to this, unlike a lot of anime schlock, the emotional moments are surprisingly not forced and are written pretty decently. I am taken a bit back.  The ending may have been okay-ish, but it was not bad. I do have to give the action props because it was surprisingly well executed for an ecchi anime. What the hell prevents this title from being simply decent or even bad? Najica herself. She might be one of the best main heroines in anime history. Not even joking with that statement. She's basically a better done version of Aika Sumeragi. She fights on a lot despite having limitations and against opponents who are essentially superhuman, she does not let her feelings cloud her judgment, she is very skilled at what she does, she is always alert and calm, and unlike Aika she doesn't get captured a lot. Comparison: 13 episodes across 3 ova series with 4 times being captured vs. 12 episodes in 1 TV series with a grand total of being caught once. I have nothing against damsel in distress characters, but if being caught often will conflict the credibility of a character's occupation then it can easily work against you. What makes her stand out is here age more than anything else. For some strange reason I bothered to check out the official site since Wikipedia had rather barren information on this series and under the character profiles I noticed she was the only human in the cast not to have her age listed. Her coworkers have theirs, but not her's. You'd think this would be trivial (and it is for the most part), but why do side characters have their ages listed but not the main heroine?  After some digging I eventually found out the official volume 1 DVD booklet says she is 27, making her the second oldest employee of her agency only after her boss. Then it hit me: How many anime main protagonists, regardless of genre, are heavily sexualized females over 25 and are legitimately good at accomplishing serious tasks? Especially when they look their age and in most anime characters look much older than they are. That is.... Actually quite rare. The creators did something unique and executed it well, especially when you consider that most anime that aim for the demographic it does prefers their heroines a lot younger than that. You know what? F**k it, the creators get a solid applause out of me for having the balls to attempt this and succeed. Best female anime character ever *dodges bricks*]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IxAKFlpdcfc (I could not find a decent applause gif. Somehow.) Stuff I am currently watching: -Gundam Reconguista in G: First three episodes weren't much, but since then the series has grown on me and it seems like Tomino finally got out of the slump he's been in since Victory Gundam stopped (I guess Wings of Rean was the big wake up call). The cast is sort of likeable, minus Raraiya. Music? Possibly the best in any anime I've heard in a while. The mechs themselves are quite good although the Megafauna trumps them all, this thing will probably end up being my favorite Gundam ship ever.
-Gundam Build Fighters Try: Not as engaging as the first series, mainly because they don't have as many nerdy moments and the music is.... Bleh. The cast is no different from the first series, just generic with not much to them. The action scenes and comedy are the highlights. Not much I can say beyond BEARGGUY MOTHER [censored]! -Cross Ange: I really didn't want to see this until it was finished because like with Cosmic Era Gundam and Dendoh Fukada knows how to suspend you until the next episode (episode hook? there's a term for this somewhere). Then a certain scene at the end of the first episode and the reception made me think "is it really or is this over blown?" and I conclude by saying spoiler[no, that cavity search was not rape, assault maybe, but not that]. Reactions like that are kind of a pet peeve of mine ever since a certain vampiric mecha anime last year- Hey look a dime! No, wait, that is a grena- *dies* Back on topic.... I noticed several people (not here) compare this to exploitation and.... Really not seeing it. Not sure why this is seen as a train wreck/guilty pleasure/trash, the writing, art, and pacing so far is legitimately good. Characters? The mains are fine, but the side ones come across as useless, mostly pinky. The setting is fleshed out nice (which is good because I was a bit nervous it wouldn't be developed well beyond the island prison). Complaints? Minor stuff like random dialogue that makes my eyes role and snakes acting strangely (ep 5) don't bother me too much. What does? The lack of mecha and monster screen time, which was in a good chunk of the promo material had which. Fukada has mostly worked on mecha in the past so it isn't like he's new to this (then again this is his first anime not aimed for children as an intended audience so who knows). Then there is the music, mostly nothing worth noting. I think the opening has potential since it starts off with an Irish tone, but then whoever is singing makes me go "wow, really?" Reminds me of Dancouga Nova's opening theme, it needed a better singer or no singing at all. Then I found out the singer is also the main star.... And the same person that voiced Fate from Nanoha (yeah I should point out now that I REALLY loathe that franchise) and that explains where all the Nanoha references people constantly make come from. New themes are coming to this series so I'll give them a chance. Currently this series ties with G-Reco so far although I look forward to the new episodes here more. Neither are likely to get anime of the year out of me, Nobunaga The Fool already cemented that position with its sheer amazement (then again it is the best anime of the current decade so that's not saying a lot). Even if this series ends up failing at least I can find amusement that someone actually shipped Beargguy-San with Perolina. Seriously, its so dumb yet brilliant.
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TsunaReborn!
Posts: 4713 Location: Cheltenham UK |
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DuelGundam2099 I love your assessment for Najica it is spot on! I remember buying it on a whim as it was on sale in a second had store. I watched the first couple of minutes and thought, God this has the thing I hate most, excessive fan service but within a few minutes it was forgotten. You may ask why? I think it's because the show starts off throwing so much of it at you in such an over the top way it becomes a joke in itself, I was wondering if there were anymore "unique" ways someone could be knocked out into a sexual position.
I agree that it certainly does pick up a few episodes in but it keeps its camp over the top antics with an extremely strong female lead - one of the strongest and quite inspirational with her outlook on life and some of the comments she makes... Obviously I'm ignoring the fact that you can see up her skirt in nearly every shot as she can't help what the director wants to show, unbeknownst to her. I don't know why but this series has always stuck with me and gave me so many laughs I rated at a masterpiece. |
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DuelGundam2099
Posts: 533 |
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Very appreciated feedback Tsuna.
I always assumed she doesn't care, most women (as far as I know) try to consciously conceal as much as they can about their bare selves while in public. So yeah, point for boldness even I didn't catch. Then again female anime characters I like the most include Gundam SEED Destiny's Lunamaria (former favorite), Gundam X's Enil, Iczer 3, Dai-Guard's Ibuki, Miami Guns's Mao, Ryu Knight's Malto, Escaflowne's Hitomi, Brain Powerd's Quincy, Cutey Honey, Diebuster's Lac'l, Fafner's Kanon, and Neo Ranga's Ushio, so maybe my my judgment on the subject of characters is not trust worthy. While I am here *notices all the Blood-C talk* Oh my, I must be in for something unique when I get around to watching that.
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Galap
Moderator
 Posts: 2354 |
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Just started RahXephon. Watched the first 4 episodes. I have known of its existence for a long time, but didn't know anything about it other than the fact that it has a reputation for being an Evangelion ripoff. Ironically, despite how much I didn't like Evangelion, dipping into the well of things that have said reputation for aping it has yielded series that I like a lot, like Geneshaft, Aquarion, and Bokurano. Even more ironically perhaps, in my opinion these series are about as different from other as they are from Evangelion, which is considerably. So, RahXephon:
Wow, this thing has REALLY got my number. It's as though this thing has been tailor made to push all my buttons: Hand drawn mecha/hand drawn everything Incredible storyboarding and evocative imagery Great animation as a general statement More realistic character designs than most anime Science fiction story that's novel and complex enough to not have a simple explanation or description Non-cliched characters that seem even already to have unique identities and existences beyond the main 'plot'. And they all have a sense of agency: Already I count no less than four factions at work here(!), and even among them their individual members all have their own beliefs and methodologies. (Man, I really like Mishima Reika. She is SO cool! Can't wait to see more of her!) All the sides here are being portrayed pretty even-handedly, which is especially good because we the viewer don't know very much about them. An intimate attention to realism in event progression. Nothing here feels contrived at all, and the presentation of things that might otherwise seem rote or cliched is so sincere that it really works (like the train accident followed by Kamina's dawning realization that the whole city has been bombed.) Really perspicacious moments of dialogue that develop some thought provoking ideas Hell, it even has the low-key kind of fanservice that I like. Any of these things by themselves would be enough to get me interested in something , so with all of them together... Yeah, I'm pretty sure this is the Real Deal for me. Can't wait to see how things develop: I'm in love already. |
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dtm42
Posts: 14084 Location: currently stalking my waifu |
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^
As president of the RahXephon Appreciation Society, I welcome you with open arms. Always nice to see another soul who has great taste in anime. I'm pretty knowledgeable about the show, or at least I like to think I am. If there's something you are having difficulty understanding, then please feel free to ask me about it. |
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Blood-
 Bargain Hunter Posts: 24161 |
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For me, I really liked the first six eppies of RahXephon, then things kind of went south before picking up at the end.
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Mr. Oshawott
 Posts: 6773 |
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I'm ten episodes into watching His and Her Circumstances. Starring in this show is Yukino Miyazawa, a high-school girl that tries to hide her true characteristic with her image as a model student. It wasn't until the appearance of Sōichirō Arima that she started to experience the feelings of romance.
I'm having fun watching HHC. The show seems to feature some dark moments despite the comedic atmosphere being portrayed. I think HHC will get a bit more funnier [and maybe a bit more darker] as I progress further into it. |
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Spastic Minnow
Bargain Hunter Exempt from Grammar Rules  Posts: 4630 Location: Gainesville, FL |
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^^^
You're in for some treats. Yukino is one of my favorite anime girls. ... and you should also be prepared for some massive frustration, the show is infamous for the poor way it ends . Just be ready to search out the manga after you finish the anime. |
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justsomeaccount
 Posts: 471 |
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^ Same. It's a show of constant highs and lows, and most of the highs being in the first half, both in content as in Hideaki Anno's direction (I mean, for the close-to-zero budget they had and tricks they played to advance the story) during the first half. But be prepared if suddenly you feel betrayed or hurt for many moments......
To say something more, still watching Tokyo Ghoul (9 so far) and well, some episodes that at least flew a little more natural although is still doesn't work with me. Also in the middle of Azumanga Daioh, and as usual it's cute, charming and a little funny, and that's all it needs to be and it's relaxing =) |
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Mr. Oshawott
Posts: 6773 |
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@Spastic Minnow
Alright, I'll give the manga a read when I'm done with the show.
From what I've read on Wikipedia, the anime and manga versions of His and Her Circumstances is said to differentiate themselves through how they were set up. |
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Spastic Minnow
Bargain Hunter Exempt from Grammar Rules Posts: 4630 Location: Gainesville, FL |
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It's a good retelling, as far as it goes. The main difference is a heightened attention to the story's humor in the anime. Both are humorous (although the stuff that comes after the anime, dealing with Arima, gets super dramatic) but the anime really plays it up and does a great job with it. The sisters get a bigger role in the anime, including a fun but completely anime original episode near the end.
As far as what I'm watching... it's a little funny. I've been buying a ton of stuff lately (although mostly rebuying lost movies and series taken in a burglary) but instead of watching my new stuff (often upgraded to BD) I'm instead currently doing another rewatch of Seitokai Yakuindomo. Which is all stored on my computer or available on Crunchyroll. There's something I can't withstand with the show... I've watched the old episodes at least a half dozen times and I still laugh uncontrollably. |
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DuelGundam2099
Posts: 533 |
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Things I watched this week.... First I'll start with the Watamote special: It was basically a lackluster episode of an already horrible anime, one that outright insults its audience in the first three minutes, has painfully slow pacing, and the Tomoko is still the worst character in anime history.... Or maybe not as I'll describe below. So yes, garbage. Yesterday I took on A.F: Archetypes Forces, a short done by the same guy that did Godzilla vs. Biollante and man did the CGI not date well on this.
Subpar visuals aside it was somewhat entertaining. Now for the bulk of this post: Black Lagoon: The Second Barrage. Oh yes, this one is going to have so much ranting in it. Most of you are not familiar with my thoughts on it and likely never go to Macross World or Sci-fi Japan so I'll do a basic repost (with minor modifications) of my thoughts from three months ago.
Really mixed on this one. The music was absolutely horrible, Revi is without a doubt one of the worst characters in any anime I have ever seen (reminds me WAY too much of Ohta from Patlabor who is in my top ten least favorite anime characters ever), the rest of the cast is stale, and the first half of the series was not interesting. Then the second half came and it was structured really well, plus Roberta was awesome as hell and I am not just saying that because she beat Revi to a pulp. spoiler[Now for The Second Barrage. Not only does this series have most of the problems of the first series, but it is even worse. First off, Dutch and Benny were gone most of the time with little to no screen time, they may have been stale but I'd rather have the focus be on them than Revy aka the only anime character I have seen that kills Nazis and yakuza and is somehow worse than they are. Hell, even the vampire twins were not as monstrous as her. "Don't mind me I'll just kill people that pose no threat and scream for mercy". She isn't just a rule 63 version of Ohta from Patlabor, she is worse. SOMEHOW. Some change would have been good even if its small, but no, she won't even help her partner when he gets beaten up by someone she would clearly fight. Kind of on the fence if she's worse than Tomoko and that is saying A LOT. The pacing got slower over time in the second half of the series (why?) to the point of becoming boring. You also have to face palm at the ineptitude of the Japanese police in the last episode "hey this person may have shot someone, lets NOT throw the cuffs on her". Don't even say diplomat license plate her ride did not come for fifty seconds. Eps 15 and 18 had very anticlimactic ends, they had nice build up yet the pay off is tripe. The philosophical babble in episode 22 is the point where I caved in and thought "this is really forced" and good lord this nihilistic point could have been decent with better execution. Roku caving in at the end felt like a cop out. Why couldn't Roberta be the main female lead instead of Revy? She isn't a complete monster and is more or less better in every aspect. Ugh. Lets also stack on how dumb the Russian mafia's goal was: "I am bored so lets kill the yakuza and kill a lot of innocent people!" Also the fan service was cranked up for no reason, it was tolerable in the first series but here it is just dumb. Why the hell is trash like this popular? It has to be the action and the characters that aren't monsters, only things in this that are actually any good.] Congratulations Black Lagoon, you succeeded in doing something I never thought was accomplished: Your second series gets a lower score than your first. Only Great Mazinger and ZZ Gundam ever accomplished that and even then the flaws in those weren't nearly this bad. I'd mention Ryu Knight: Adeu's Legend 2 and 3 and Gundam Wing: Endless Waltz, but those are more wrap up stories with much shorter lengths than an actual series. It is times like this I wish I didn't have such a high alcohol tolerance so I could drink off this nonsense. Some of you are probably thinking "Duel how many anime have you watched and what do you think of them?" To which I respond "listing is against the rules here but if it wasn't I'd show you and boy is it a very huge list". Maybe I'll post a temporary pastebin at some point if anyone's curious. |
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phia_one
Posts: 1661 Location: Pennsylvania |
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I finished And Yet the Town Moves. The first three episodes weren't that good IMO. I really started to enjoy it from episode 4. However, I was caught off guard by the abrupt mood change around episode 10. spoiler[A slice of life show suddenly having aliens, time travel, a ghost, and then getting deadly serious with Hotori literally becoming brain dead and then coming back to life in the last episode .]
I didn't find much of the humor to be funny, but that was because I don't know Japanese and many of the jokes are puns or some Japanese pop culture reference that had to have notes on the screen for you to get the joke. And it was kinda hard to watch at some points because of Chiaki Omigawa's voice. Does it fit Hotori's character? Absolutely. My biggest pet peeve was the frequent use of weird camera angles. They seemed unnecessary, Overall, I would rate the show as Good. If it had kept the same pace/style like the middle episodes did, then I would have rated it Very Good. |
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