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Spring 2011 Anime Thread of ZAWA ZAWA, Money, emo Cyclops, and fun^10xint^40=Ir2

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Risette

A Good Citizen
duckroll said:
Wut. Princess Mononoke was released by Miramax. They were owned by Disney at the time. This was way before the formal Disney/Ghibli contract.
Oh. Well. I guess that clears that up.

Dub still sucks though. Needs a re-do.
 
I actually really like the Princess Mononoke dub. Man what a good movie that was, need to rewatch it. Any word on a blu-ray release?

But right now, I'm rewatching Read or Die tv. It also has a pretty good dub.
 

trejo

Member
doomed1 said:
That's okay. As long as you can recognize how awful the plot is, no one's gonna fault you for enjoying the great eye-candy in the film.
I thought Ferngully handled that plot better, honestly.
 

Branduil

Member
firehawk12 said:
Hrm, well, for you, I'll watch it sometime this summer.

What the heck am I in for? :lol
Honestly I think you'll sincerely enjoy the parts relating to the relationship between the protagonist and her boyfriend, since that is mostly legitimately well-done, unlike basically everything else in the show. Plus it tries to subvert magical girl tropes!
badly
 

firehawk12

Subete no aware
Branduil said:
Honestly I think you'll sincerely enjoy the parts relating to the relationship between the protagonist and her boyfriend, since that is mostly legitimately well-done, unlike basically everything else in the show. Plus it tries to subvert magical girl tropes!
badly
Hrm, well, I look forward to the madness.

And, I have to admit, the speech is awesome in its own absurd kind of way.
 

jman2050

Member
trejo said:
I-I like Avatar because it's pretty to look at. I'm sorry. :(

It's weird for me cause, as much as I rightfully bag on Avatar for its story, I can't deny that I was watching most of the movie in the theater with my mouth open in awe of what I was watching. It's a very very very very very pretty movie.
 

hellclerk

Everything is tsundere to me
jman2050 said:
oh no he's definitely not well written, I just think he's interesting.

Then again the audience surrogate in a particular story is almost never written all that well because, after all, they have a role that needs to be fulfilled.
That's acceptable, and I can see where you're coming from, but on the side of audience surrogate, I tend to feel that the best characters for that sort of role are supporting cast. See: Ruri in Space Battleship Nadesico. Alternately, a solid MC audience insert is a jerk-ass type character popular in KyoAni shows (i.e. the Key shows, Haruhi, etc). But basically any level of continued self-awareness and nonchalance in the face of silliness is acceptable. Really, the MC in order to have an appropriate audience connection would ideally have a more muted reaction to things around him and capable of being as clever as the audience likes to imagine themselves. This could actually work with the current MC, his reactions to some things are just a little too strong, which was why that last scene felt off to me. It's like he's straddling the line between Jerk-ass with a heart of gold and your typical APS ridden MC. It's annoying to me. :/
 

Branduil

Member
Really the problem is I can't properly sell the show without spoiling scenes that really should be experienced in the moment. The inherent goofiness of Arjuna loses some of its impact when you know about the scenes beforehand.
 

jman2050

Member
doomed1 said:
That's acceptable, and I can see where you're coming from, but on the side of audience surrogate, I tend to feel that the best characters for that sort of role are supporting cast. See: Ruri in Space Battleship Nadesico. Alternately, a solid MC audience insert is a jerk-ass type character popular in KyoAni shows (i.e. the Key shows, Haruhi, etc). But basically any level of continued self-awareness and nonchalance in the face of silliness is acceptable. Really, the MC in order to have an appropriate audience connection would ideally have a more muted reaction to things around him and capable of being as clever as the audience likes to imagine themselves. This could actually work with the current MC, his reactions to some things are just a little too strong, which was why that last scene felt off to me. It's like he's straddling the line between Jerk-ass with a heart of gold and your typical APS ridden MC. It's annoying to me. :/

tl;dr MC tries to be Kyon but fails
 

hellclerk

Everything is tsundere to me
mAcOdIn said:
Oh I totally agree, I'm just fucking around. That said, I really would feel indebted to a crazy person if they gave me half their food, how do I repay that? I could replace the food that day but to have a crazy person provide for me, even if for just one meal, that'd be something that'd force me to serve them till I die or some shit, that's why I don't accept free stuff. But yeah, the MC's a 2d, self-centered twat made just for the story, I agree, I love how by the first day he's already hanging up on his aunt, like that'd really happen.
Actually, they went halfsies on it if you remember. But yeah, I am interested in where the story goes though, because one thing that's nice about this sort of character: if you want your show to be half-way decent, he's got to change in some manner. It's how they handle the change that counts.

jman2050 said:
tl;dr MC can't decide between being Kyon and *insert angsty anime protagonist here* and fails
fixed. :p
 

Jex

Member
The King of Braves: Gao Gai Gar 5

There's a firetruck and a crane and they transform into robots FOR GREAT JUSTICE.

It's certainly pretty standard fair, but the execution is well above average. Still, it's a long way to go before I hit the crazy stuff.
 

jman2050

Member
doomed1 said:

Yeah that works better.

I think I'm spoiled by Kyon because he's by far the most effective character of that archetype I've seen in anime and makes that show work completely on his own. That's quite a feat.
 
jman2050 said:
tl;dr MC tries to be Kyon but fails

As much as he's supposed to be Mr. Snarky Straight Man Audience Surrogate, I find him just as bizarre as everyone else in the cast. It's why I find Denpa Onna fascinating; it's like I'm a sociologist examining some alien civilization.
 

jman2050

Member
hosannainexcelsis said:
As much as he's supposed to be Mr. Snarky Straight Man Audience Surrogate, I find him just as bizarre as everyone else in the cast. It's why I find Denpa Onna fascinating; it's like I'm a sociologist examining some alien civilization.

I'm not gonna lie.

I watch because Erio is moe as hell.
 
Finally disinfected the computer with that problem, hopefully I should be able to watch something newer again pretty soon...
mAcOdIn said:
For me to say Sora no Woto's "good" is actually to say Sora no Woto has potential to be good. Sora no Woto's like a beautiful piece of land that's undeveloped and you're out looking for a place to build a home and you find this beautiful piece of land that's Sora no Woto and compare it with other homes that are already built but the land they're built on is just shit. Many of them are fine homes, great even, but since they're on bad land they are what they are, they can't ever be anything more. But Sora no Woto's land, while undeveloped, has infinite potential but nothing's there yet, it's undeveloped. So which home is the better home? That's Sora no Woto. If a season two came out I would be first in line to watch it. Would that be because I felt that season one was great and I wanted more of the same? No, it's because I'd hope that with the second season that they were able to deliver some of the latent potential the series had that was lacking in season one.
That's an interesting way of looking at it. I do think that it had more substance than you say here, but yes, it is true that the setting really makes the show, and a lot of it is just potential that doesn't get far enough because of the short length of the series and the fact that the focus on plot is split with the "group of girls" stuff. So yes, I definitely want more of the series, and do find it frustrating ending with such a clear non-ending ending as it has. But even so, what is there was more than good enough for me to say that it was a really good series.

But it is. There's two questions here, "what are good shows" and "what are the best shows from 2010?" If I was asked the former Sora no Woto wouldn't be anywhere near the tip of my tongue but force me to recommend something only from 2010 and all of a sudden it's on the shirt list of what I'd recommend. That's not true quality. I don't judge something's worth on a curve, a good show is always a good show but there are people who are going to watch something every season regardless of how they stack up to past or future works just because they want to watch something new.

Just like Clannad, if you asked my favorite girl from Clannad I'd tell you it's Kyou Fujibayashi but ask for my favorite female anime character and she's not even on the list. Favorite girl from Samurai Girls? Gisen. Does she make the list of favorite anime girls? Not by a long shot.

Sora no Woto's like that.
Ah. I know what you mean, but obviously don't agree that it applies in this case. :)

... Well, I will agree on the noone in Clannad would be on my overall 'best characters' list, so far anyway, but not about SnW anyway. :)

I like to think it's not that I hate almost everything but that I come to the table with a uniform set of expectations. I believe many here like anime, of course I like anime too but I think some here, like, like anime. What I mean is that if they had the exact same show, live action, exact same quality or lack-thereof and everything else that they'd choose the anime over the live action, because they like anime. I'm not quite like that, I like anime because I like the drawn look, because I like the fact it was created by scratch as opposed to dressing someone up I've seen before in new clothes and selling them as someone else but I don't like, like anime. Because of that I'm not inclined to necessarily like anything in a given year, let alone a season. But even then of course I don't hate everything, I like the Twelve Kingdoms, right? This season so far I like Ano Hana, Iroha, Denpa and maybe some more once I get to see them, of course they may end up sucking but clearly I'm not truly full of hate and scorn. I'm not some self hating otaku like Ogiue from genshiken.
Not all full of hate and scorn maybe, just mostly? :)

But seriously, yeah, I'm sure that some people do think that as you say, that an anime version of something would be better than the same exact thing in live action or something (same quality etc)... I'm not sure what I think, I'd probably mostly agree with you; I like anime, but certainly not to the exclusion of other mediums.

Well this part is my fault but I thought the show would get "serious." They were pretty heavy handed regarding the state of the world despite never spelling it out, they tied the current girls to the past maidens, they were a military unit, had serious flashbacks and they had the princess of the kingdom there. I just couldn't wrap my head that they were going to take all of these pieces and essentially make a military K-on in a fictional world. Is that my fault? Oh yeah, but that's not entirely my fault because they constantly alluded to it. Constantly. Of course they also constantly never delivered on it and treated it like K-on so there was as much a hint that they wouldn't go that direction as well.
Bah, it's not just post-apocalyptic K-on... things do happen, it's not just all vapid cute nothingness. SnW has far more substance than K-On. The characters are more competent, too, certainly in part because of the setting. I mean, yeah, obviously the series is a cross between a serious drama and a group of girls comedy, which is a somewhat odd (and unique) concept, but there was a fair amount on either side of that. Every episode had at least SOMETHING that continued the main plot. Sure though, maybe it'd have been better more about the plot and world, less about some of the sillier comedy aspects... but it mostly worked. They certainly at least partially delivered on the serious side. So sure I could support maybe changing the focus somewhat, but as it is I think they did a pretty good job. And plus, having some less serious stuff is helpful in a series that otherwise could have been just constant, serial depression.

I would say though that even so some of the stupider comedy parts (not all of them, many work, but some) do hold it back some and ensure that it's no Haibane Renmei, certainly (and some other things too, but I don't want to spoil anything about Haibane Renmei...), but still it's pretty good.

Right, no real way to subjectively quantify my opinion nor anyone else's but I'll still try damnit!
And thus the problem, most people believe this about their own opinions but not about anyone else's, yes? :)

Anyways, you may think I'm biased against Sora no Woto but it's only because of my bias that I finished it and watched every week. If I went in expecting nothing, saw that the first two episodes were K-on in fatigues and had no reason to think otherwise then that would have been the end of it, I wouldn't have watched any more. So it's my bias that even allows me to say it was my favorite of 2010, I only finished it because of my preconceived notion of what should be coming down the pipe, it's what kept me watching and sure, it's also why I'm rather disappointed in it. Had I not even been wrong about the show and had not formed a preconceived notion over where it was headed I would have unceremoniously ditched it early on and I wouldn't care about it enough to bother talking about it. Like Star Driver, I saw it sucked early on and dropped it. No prefabbed notion of how it'd be, I saw it for what it was, realized it was crap and moved on and because I didn't invest any time real time in it while I think it was utter shit I don't feel any emotion to it. But I wanted Sora no Woto to be good, I invested that time and that makes it's failings all the more painful.
It's not K-on just because it has similar character art! The similarities were mostly superficial, I wasn't so sure that I'd like it at first glance because of the similar character art, but the quite different nature of the show became almost immediately apparent and I really liked while, of course, I'd never say that about K-on. You're equating the two far too much, art is not the same as content... sure, it has some four girls comedy show elements, but that's not all it is, there is a serious side too. Also, even when it's doing that it's not doing it like K-on would (like, the comedy bonus episode where they're all acting ridiculous... because they're drunk.).

As for Star Driver though, on that we agree. I saw it was mostly awful and very dull early on, and dropped it.
 

Dresden

Member
hosannainexcelsis said:
I know the closeups of Erio and the other girls are supposed to be moe, but they don't work that way for me. Those lips and that blush - it isn't natural.
Yeah, it looks weird. It's too plastic-y.
 

Steroyd

Member
mAcOdIn said:
I actually don't have a single problem with this unless he killed her and kept the dress or something sinister like that.

Ok, sure, she was 10 when she died but so was he, so frankly I don't think age makes a bit of difference here, he's sniffing a 10 year old's shit because that's as far as she got. Wake me up when it's revealed he killed her so she could forever stay 10 or something like that as opposed to something that is just happenstance.

It's not the age difference itself that I have the problem with as you say she died at that age, it's that him sniffing the girls dress after what I'm assuming is 5/6 years has passed.

And there's tons of lame reasons he could have some clothes. Maybe they all stayed over at his family's place once and she brought a change of clothes, maybe Menma's mother later did a garage sale to get rid of some stuff and he bought them, it's not that big a deal unless he took them from her dead body.

Judging from episode 1 it doesn't seem like the Mother would get rid of Menma's stuff.

The only reason that scene is getting so much attention from me, is mostly because the show didn't look to have that type of stuff in it at all outside of the loli fanservice, hell this episode alone was some nice light hearted nostalgic tale of friends slowly reforming bonds before it foreshadowed something creepy for 15 seconds.
 

jman2050

Member
hosannainexcelsis said:
I know the closeups of Erio and the other girls are supposed to be moe, but they don't work that way for me. Those lips and that blush - it isn't natural.

The sparkles man

The sparkles...
 

firehawk12

Subete no aware
A Black Falcon said:
It's not K-on just because it has similar character art! The similarities were mostly superficial, I wasn't so sure that I'd like it at first glance because of the similar character art, but the quite different nature of the show became almost immediately apparent and I really liked while, of course, I'd never say that about K-on. You're equating the two far too much, art is not the same as content... sure, it has some four girls comedy show elements, but that's not all it is, there is a serious side too. Also, even when it's doing that it's not doing it like K-on would (like, the comedy bonus episode where they're all acting ridiculous... because they're drunk.).

Whoa, are you guys talking about Sora no Woto again? Even a year later, I still think it was one of the better shows of 2010. Dat mono no aware.
 
firehawk12 said:
Whoa, are you guys talking about Sora no Woto again? Even a year later, I still think it was one of the better shows of 2010. Dat mono no aware.
I said it was my favorite show of 2010, macodin had to complain about it at length again in response (oddly enough saying how it was probably his favorite show of 2010 but it's also bad), so yeah, we are...
 

hellclerk

Everything is tsundere to me
hosannainexcelsis said:
As much as he's supposed to be Mr. Snarky Straight Man Audience Surrogate, I find him just as bizarre as everyone else in the cast. It's why I find Denpa Onna fascinating; it's like I'm a sociologist examining some alien civilization.
Really? Are the characters REALLY that bizarre? I know plenty of people like the characters on the show, myself included. Maybe it's just the off-kilter framing? I'm pretty damned good at seeing through a show's framing to get to the real meat. I just get the impression that the perspective of the show frames the characters as "bizarre", because their base characters are all pretty standard stuff. The weirdest thing that's happened so far is Sandwich Girl showing up in a sandwich costume, which basically said to me: "Oh, she has a part time job getting people to go to a local eatery". Nothing too bizarre to me.

I'd like to hear your reasoning though. That's definitely interesting to me.
 

firehawk12

Subete no aware
A Black Falcon said:
I said it was my favorite show of 2010, macodin had to complain about it at length again in response (oddly enough saying how it was probably his favorite show of 2010 but it's also bad), so yeah, we are...
ABFxmacodin is still my favourite pairing. ;)
 

hellclerk

Everything is tsundere to me
trejo said:
Yeah, BranduilXdoomed1 have drifted apart considerably. It's like the spark is gone, man.
Well of course, we're not trolling each other over Madoka anymore. Don't worry, I'll troll some more after I gather the will to watch those last two episodes. :p

Still need to watch me my Hidan no Aria first. :3
 

Articalys

Member
Serial Experiments Lain 5-7

Alright, I give up trying to understand anything. I'll just sit back and watch the pretty colors for the next six episodes.

I'll bet Evangelion is a cakewalk next to this.

Nice music though.
 

jman2050

Member
trejo said:
But you already have Dresden you slut!

As long as Dresden doesn't go catatonic and guilt me into coming back to him leading to doomed1 brutally murdering me and then subsequently getting murdered by Dresden, I think I'm cool.
 
Articalys said:
Serial Experiments Lain 5-7

Alright, I give up trying to understand anything. I'll just sit back and watch the pretty colors for the next six episodes.

I'll bet Evangelion is a cakewalk next to this.

Nice music though.

Actually, the second half is when they begin actually explaining things.
 

Jex

Member
jman2050 said:
I'm not gonna lie.

I watch because Erio is moe as hell.
You don't need to hide your moe love from us, jman.
firehawk12 said:
Whoa, are you guys talking about Sora no Woto again? Even a year later, I still think it was one of the better shows of 2010. Dat mono no aware.
Worse than Star Driver confirmed.
firehawk12 said:
ABFxmacodin is still my favourite pairing. ;)
I knew this thread hadn't been weird enough lately.
 

mAcOdIn

Member
A Black Falcon said:
Bah, it's not just post-apocalyptic K-on... things do happen, it's not just all vapid cute nothingness. SnW has far more substance than K-On. The characters are more competent, too, certainly in part because of the setting. I mean, yeah, obviously the series is a cross between a serious drama and a group of girls comedy, which is a somewhat odd (and unique) concept, but there was a fair amount on either side of that. Every episode had at least SOMETHING that continued the main plot. Sure though, maybe it'd have been better more about the plot and world, less about some of the sillier comedy aspects... but it mostly worked. They certainly at least partially delivered on the serious side. So sure I could support maybe changing the focus somewhat, but as it is I think they did a pretty good job. And plus, having some less serious stuff is helpful in a series that otherwise could have been just constant, serial depression.
It IS just post-apocalyptic K-on! That's what makes it so damn absurd. They're shown training just as much as HTT or whatever the band is in K-on's shown practicing. Seriously. And just like K-on's practices devolve into eating cake and drinking tea Sora no Woto's training devolved into picnics and shit. And, you know, every episode of K-on also inched forward the plot, getting the guitar, learning to play the guitar, practicing for gigs at school, taking tests to go to school together, K-on had little strings that drug the plot forward just as much as Sora no Woto. And lets not forget how fucking similar Yui and the Yui clone in SnW were, only fucking difference was the instrument.

And part of my criticism may be because I was in the infantry so when they do their damn training in Sora no Woto all I can do is laugh, it was that bad, leaving their fucking gear behind, idiotic. Every instance they had in the show to enforce the concept they were a military unit besides the uniforms was wasted with the exception of the tank, it was like their leaders wanted them all to die because they sure as fuck weren't teaching them shit.
A Black Falcon said:
I would say though that even so some of the stupider comedy parts (not all of them, many work, but some) do hold it back some and ensure that it's no Haibane Renmei, certainly (and some other things too, but I don't want to spoil anything about Haibane Renmei...), but still it's pretty good.
It wasn't the comedy that held back the series, it was the terrible imagining of a military unit along with the absurd character placement. What I mean by character placement is this, you have the princess, a veteran of the last war and some secret weapon genius chick, all supposedly massive assets for that country all placed in some fucking podunk outpost in the middle of nowhere and you have them do piss gags and running some illicit moonshine operation. Why these characters? The show would have made infinitely more sense and been orders of magnitude less offensive if all of the girls were relative nobodies to their country, then everything would have made sense but instead they took almost the whole main cast of the country's military and had them dick around as a show. Absurd. That's like if they took all the main characters from Lord of the Rings and had them fucking dick around in the forest for 12 episodes playing grab ass and then just inexplicably place them in Mordor and have them beat Sauron just because they're the heroes.
A Black Falcon said:
And thus the problem, most people believe this about their own opinions but not about anyone else's, yes? :)
No, I'm fair enough to believe this about everyone's opinions I just don't care.
A Black Falcon said:
As for Star Driver though, on that we agree. I saw it was mostly awful and very dull early on, and dropped it.
Well you dodged one bullet.
Steroyd said:
It's not the age difference itself that I have the problem with as you say she died at that age, it's that him sniffing the girls dress after what I'm assuming is 5/6 years has passed.
I don't get it, so you'd be ok with him sniffing her shit say a week after her death but a few years later it's now weird?
 

firehawk12

Subete no aware
mAcOdIn said:
It IS just post-apocalyptic K-on! That's what makes it so damn absurd. They're shown training just as much as HTT or whatever the band is in K-on's shown practicing. Seriously. And just like K-on's practices devolve into eating cake and drinking tea Sora no Woto's training devolved into picnics and shit. And, you know, every episode of K-on also inched forward the plot, getting the guitar, learning to play the guitar, practicing for gigs at school, taking tests to go to school together, K-on had little strings that drug the plot forward just as much as Sora no Woto. And lets not forget how fucking similar Yui and the Yui clone in SnW were, only fucking difference was the instrument.

And part of my criticism may be because I was in the infantry so when they do their damn training in Sora no Woto all I can do is laugh, it was that bad, leaving their fucking gear behind, idiotic. Every instance they had in the show to enforce the concept they were a military unit besides the uniforms was wasted with the exception of the tank, it was like their leaders wanted them all to die because they sure as fuck weren't teaching them shit.
It wasn't the comedy that held back the series, it was the terrible imagining of a military unit along with the absurd character placement. What I mean by character placement is this, you have the princess, a veteran of the last war and some secret weapon genius chick, all supposedly massive assets for that country all placed in some fucking podunk outpost in the middle of nowhere and you have them do piss gags and running some illicit moonshine operation. Why these characters? The show would have made infinitely more sense and been orders of magnitude less offensive if all of the girls were relative nobodies to their country, then everything would have made sense but instead they took almost the whole main cast of the country's military and had them dick around as a show. Absurd. That's like if they took all the main characters from Lord of the Rings and had them fucking dick around in the forest for 12 episodes playing grab ass and then just inexplicably place them in Mordor and have them beat Sauron just because they're the heroes.

Were you expecting Generation Kill in space or something? I think your problems with Sora no Woto are similar to my problems with the Wandering Son adaptation anyway - expectations ruined the show.

Certainly, other than episode 7 and the two part TV-finale, the show isn't about the military in the least.
 

mAcOdIn

Member
firehawk12 said:
Were you expecting Generation Kill in space or something? I think your problems with Sora no Woto are similar to my problems with the Wandering Son adaptation anyway - expectations ruined the show.

Certainly, other than episode 7 and the two part TV-finale, the show isn't about the military in the least.
I've admitted as much several times but I do think it's not entirely my fault, after all, I think it makes very little sense to have the specific characters they did and not go the route I was expecting.

Like I said, it'd be akin to Lord of the Rings where you have the Kings of the elves, dwarfs and humans and then two scrubs all banded together while there's a war brewing and you place those characters at the beach chasing women and playing volleyball just to show up at the last episode to save the day. People'd be a little shocked, you just don't really assemble that type of cast for that and so it was with SnW.
 

firehawk12

Subete no aware
mAcOdIn said:
I've admitted as much several times but I do think it's not entirely my fault, after all, I think it makes very little sense to have the specific characters they did and not go the route I was expecting.

Like I said, it'd be akin to Lord of the Rings where you have the Kings of the elves, dwarfs and humans and then two scrubs all banded together while there's a war brewing and you place those characters at the beach chasing women and playing volleyball just to show up at the last episode to save the day. People'd be a little shocked, you just don't really assemble that type of cast for that and so it was with SnW.

I think they say that they were in a no name town and it was essentially the place where they dumped people who didn't fit in anywhere else. It's why they don't even get a tank and only get to play at being soldiers.

It's why you get the contrast between "real soldiers" - the evil Colonel guy - and the main cast. If anything, none of them actually want to be soldiers in the traditional sense.
 

tiff

Banned
mAcOdIn said:
I know I shouldn't like this but I kinda do really like Maria+Holic. This scene from episode 2 cracks me up, the way Maria trips Kanako. They also upped Ryuken's moe levels by having her cry. I shouldn't like this but when it's so purposely absurd I kinda can't help it.
That reminds me, I really need to get caught up with Alive :(
trejo said:
I-I like Avatar because it's pretty to look at. I'm sorry. :(
I enjoyed Avatar because I enjoyed Dances with Wolves and I didn't mind watching it a second time.
 
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