After a few weeks of Fall 2011, here are my impressions of the shows I have checked out so far:
Fate/Zero - Extremely good, would recommend to almost anyway. A great mix of serious drama, great characters, and solid direction with really high production values and nice art.
Guilty Crown - Really dumb show, but it's entertaining. Writing is pretty pathetic, and instead of the successor of Code Geass it is starting to feel more like a poor attempt at imitating Code Geass.
Un-Go - Bad mystery show with bad direction and bad writing. Art is also bad. Somehow I cannot stop watching it though. Things break down. People break. I will break too. It's deep.
Last Exile 2 - Cheap production values, less interesting than the original series, looks like Gonzo made this the year after Last Exile 1 and decided to lock it up and only release it now. Dropped.
Persona 4 - Boring adaptation of the game. Direction isn't interesting. Art is pretty bad. Zzzzz. Dropped.
Gundam AGE - I tried watching ep1-3, but couldn't get through the entirety of a single episode. Boring characters, generic set up, boring everything. Dropped.
Well I exaggerated, only the first part was stupid. Seriously, when you live overseas and speak the local langage you should be able to pick up whether the person in front of you speaks Japanese or English.
2nd part and 3rd part were good.
Today I happened to notice that my local independent theatre was screening The Girl Who Leapt Through Time for free. I've never actually seen an anime in a theatre before so I decided to head along, even though I'm very familiar with the movie. I was also slightly curious why it was being shown at all, considering that it's not really the kind of thing they put on. I was actually expecting about three other people to turn up, but instead they had about 50. Not too shabby.
Interestingly (or not, depending on why you attended the screening) it was put on by the local Universities Japanese culture facility. This meant a brief introduction and question and answer session by one their lecturers, a sociologist who specialises in Japan. Listening to someone with a German accent pronounce Japanese (quite well, from what I could tell) was a rather surreal experience. Furthermore, listening to someone who is an expert, and not an 'internet expert', on the subject was a very informative experience especially as he was looking on things from a sociological perspective as opposed to a critical perspective. It was certainly depressing when he reminded everyone that "these kind of shoujo works are of course, an enjoyable fantasy, because Japanese women are not liberated. Many are still hosing to be housewives, especially in this economic climate.
I did feel a little bad when he started his Q&A session and there was only a bunch of random teenagers left in the theatre. One particular gentleman did ask a lot of questions about anime as a whole, even though it clearly wasn't the lecturers field of expertise (which isn't to say he wasn't up to speed with it). Lucky a few people stuck around to ask some slightly more broad-ranging questions which ended up providing some interesting thoughts on the film as a whole, some which I had not had myself. I can't really ask for more than that! Specifically, their was a discussion about how much pressure Japanese children are put under at school, all the examination imagery in the film, and how limited your choices actually are vs how much freedom you may think you have. In Matoko's case, it seems that she's presented with a variety of binary choices: this or that.
As for the film itself: it looked great on the big screen. As this is fourth or fifth time I've watched the film, I was already very familiar with the material. So much so that I didn't really need to read the subtitles, which was great as I could then focus on other things. For example, the weird CG imagery that Matoko sees the first time she
time leaps
looks pretty good on a large screen. It wasn't all roses, however.
This time round, my problems with the film became crystallised and it's really to do with the pacing. There's two scenes in particular that are quite troublesome. The first one is the
stop time sequence. This comes at what you assume is the finale of the film and it follows from a particularly climactic build up, fake out, and then real climax. This is where Hosdoa wants to slow the film down a bit, but instead he grinds it to a halt. The stuff that needed to be explained by that scene could have been covered a lot more effectively if there had been less of it. There's about 17 lingering shots on frozen objects, followed by really slow narration. Yes, I know that's the point, but by the time I've seen my 3rd frozen object I get the point: time's stopped. The monologue doesn't even begin until we've seen about 15 frozen objects. It just drags the film down far too much. If it had ended there it would be fine, but as we need some more scenes (and character growth) the movie has to continue - but by then it's lost it's pacing and excellent momentum which carried so much of the work.
It's really quite unfortunate, as it makes the film feel much longer than it actually is.
The second problematic scene is the
running sequence. I know why it's there: we're seeing Matoko actually care about something. However, it's just handled badly. In this particular instance Matoko doesn't even need to run to meet up with Chiaki. She's not in a rush when she's leaving school and talking to people, then suddenly she just takes off running.
From an editing perspective,we don't even see her start to run, it just cuts to her running, side-on. We don't see where she's running from or too because the background is completely flat. As the geography hasn't been established, and the shot is so close to her side that it's hard to get a feel of her moving though a space that's been defined. Especially as in the previous shot we don't even see her start to run. Compare and contrast to the Millenium Actress running scenes which are far better at capturing the same spirit. Heck, even compare it to the early scene where she's chasing the bicycle down the hill yelling at it to stop. We don't even see her arrive at her destination properly, it just cuts to it and she's there. Furthermore, the 'acting' for her running is slightly awkward. All in all, I feel it's a problematic scene that isn't connected very well (visually) to the scenes that proceed and follow from it.
Guilty Crown - Really dumb show, but it's entertaining. Writing is pretty pathetic, and instead of the successor of Code Geass it is starting to feel more like a poor attempt at imitating Code Geass.
If only they had copied the main character from Code Geass it might've ended up pretty decent. No idea why they decided to go with the generic, whiny anime hero. That kills so many shows for me.
Steins; Gate
Yondemasuyo, Azazel-san
hajime no ippo new challenger(if you haven't seen the original then go watch that now)
Durarara!
Shows to watch this Season are
Ben-to
chihayafuru
Fate Zero -Warning avoid first episode just read that on Wikipedia
Mirai nikki-if you like yanderes
Phi Brain - yugi-oh but with puzzles
Just to clarify for those who don't already know, I actually like The Girl Who Leapt Through Time quite a bit, as I've said previously, but I had to explain what the problems I had with those parts at length.
Maken-ki episode 1
Boobs boobs panty shot panty shot childhood friends panty shot boobs jiggle physics boobs panty shot panty shot unusually uninteresting sight of 2 wizard girls beating the shit out of each other in a school panty shot panty shot first kiss (instead of a concussion) oooooh a mysterious tattoo on a unkown student who happens to be the protagonist CONTRIVED COINCIDENCE PLOT PLOT panty shot panty shot panty shot harem harem harem.
God that was absolutely awkward to watch. It's like the producers had in mind an objective to cram as many clichés and bad tropes in one 24-minutes episode of an ersatz of Mai HiME. I didn't see the funny in this. Only the fanservice.
On the redeeming side, I er liked the voice acting and the academy's logo. I don't think I'll continue to watch.
This was the first time Takanashi's infatuation with small things came off as genuinely awkward. That dude is gonna land himself in jail sooner or later.
Last year:
House of the 5 Leaves
Tatami Galaxy
Durarara
Sora No Woto
Kuragehime
Katanagatari
Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt
There was also K-On S2, if you watched the first season.
Probably missing a couple there...
This year:
Usagi Drop
Penguin Drum
Madoka
Hanasaku Iroha
Wandering Son
Fate/Zero...so far anyway.
edit
Oh and Redline is a really fun racing movie. Watch that.
Steins; Gate
Yondemasuyo, Azazel-san
hajime no ippo new challenger(if you haven't seen the original then go watch that now)
Durarara!
Shows to watch this Season are
Ben-to
chihayafuru
Fate Zero -Warning avoid first episode just read that on Wikipedia
Mirai nikki-if you like yanderes
Phi Brain - yugi-oh but with puzzles
Thanks for the recommendations guys. This will get me a long way. Some of them look pretty interesting, I think I will surely like them and I'm already watching some Madoka and I'm quite impressed so far.
Thanks for the recommendations guys. This will get me a long way. Some of them look pretty interesting, I think I will surely like them and I'm already watching some Madoka and I'm quite impressed so far.
I know you're already deluged with suggestions, but I have to recommend one more series which somehow no one else has listed: Kaiji Season 2, a excellent, tense high-stakes gambling show with the best narrator ever. Be sure to watch the first season (2007-8) too if you haven't already.
And now we have a shady organization looking to harness the power of the half-price bento warriors for some reason or other. Shit just keeps getting better and better.
It's a battle of ideologies - dfc vs. big boobs, tentacles vs. guns, boring show vs. fun show, communism set against the glorious moral supremacy of the Republic. Mammers will take this one. It is known.
What a crazy erratic overdramatic Shoujo this is, it moves from one bout of drama to the next so much in so few episodes it feels like an episodic series. @_@
I would have thought the situation that was set from the first episode would settle at that tone for a while because it goes on for 51 eps, but that was a naive assumption and I'm wondering what is to come in the next 40 eps given that pretty much everything has happened in the first 10.
It's a battle of ideologies - dfc vs. big boobs, tentacles vs. guns, boring show vs. fun show, communism set against the glorious moral supremacy of the Republic. Mammers will take this one. It is known.
What a crazy erratic overdramatic Shoujo this is, it moves from one bout of drama to the next so much in so few episodes it feels like an episodic series. @_@
I would have thought the situation that was set from the first episode would settle at that tone for a while because it goes on for 51 eps, but that was a naive assumption and I'm wondering what is to come in the next 40 eps given that pretty much everything has happened in the first 10.
I've thought of watching the Chinese live action version of the show, just for shiggles. Is the heroine the typical blank doormat that everyone loves, or the typical blank genius that still needs a man to save her?
Ben-to 4
Wow, some serious ecchi business going on here now. I guess we are in harem mode in this show though, huh? The whole Shiraume thing is getting a bit too silly. We get it. Unless she joins the club or something they outta just sweep her under the rug and give the others some more time. The first couple episodes didn't make me feel for the characters whatsoever, but the whole
Shaga having repressed feelings for Sato (is that the main characters name?) was a bit touching
so I wont give up on that aspect quite yet.
The reasons I watch this show persists with how funny something like
an evil organization monitoring kids fighting over half-priced bento is.
I've thought of watching the Chinese live action version of the show, just for shiggles. Is the heroine the typical blank doormat that everyone loves, or the typical blank genius that still needs a man to save her?
She stands up for herself and gets marked by the F4 (the 4 rich bishies), so she starts getting bullied by the whole school (because the F4's daddies have that much influence) from day one but doesn't take it lying down.
Doesn't take her long to go squeeee at one of the pretty boys who helps her occasionally as you'd imagine.
She stands up for herself and gets marked by the F4 (the 4 rich bishies), so she starts getting bullied by the whole school (because the F4's daddies have that much influence) from day one but doesn't take it lying down.
Doesn't take her long to go squeeee at one of the pretty boys who helps her occasionally as you'd imagine.
