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

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RurouniZel

Asks questions so Ezalc doesn't have to
zeroshiki said:
Spoilers say
siscon mode on

Damn it all. :/ Well, I like the artwork, so there's that I suppose. It's the best work I've seen AIC do animation-wise in a long while.
 
[C] 8

Plot wise, this was the most interesting episode. A ton of people come down with apathy syndrome (Persona 3),
an important side character dies, and an entire country is phased out of existence.
They're really going all out with the future and money philosophy.

I think watching 3 episodes of Mononoke prior to this made the episode better. I hope Nakamura sticks with these kinds of shows going forward.
 
Dedication Through Light said:
Should get back to watching current stuff, backlog of [C], Seikon II, and Sekaiichi, and Toriko (still on the crossover).

Finally started Reborn though since Viz put it on their site (hope it gets dubbed). Five minutes in and its so awesome, hooked. Tsuna dying will mode 10x more epic in the anime than in the manga. Hopes its still current with the manga.

Reborn anime ended with the future arc. It might be done or they might be waiting for the manga to get ahead before starting up again like Gintama.

RobertM said:
Is Steins;Gate any good? I don't know what to watch on that list besides Kaiji; so much moe crap.

There's a lot of good shows this season and barely any of them are moe. But yes, Steins;Gate is good.
 

Lafiel

と呼ぶがよい
cosmicblizzard said:
I think watching 3 episodes of Mononoke prior to this made the episode better. I hope Nakamura sticks with these kinds of shows going forward.
.....

I'm sorry all i can say is lol.

:p
 

zeroshiki

Member
Oh man, I can't believe how moe Tiger & Bunny is.

cosmicblizzard said:
I think watching 3 episodes of Mononoke prior to this made the episode better. I hope Nakamura sticks with these kinds of shows going forward.

<3 inadvertent trolling

Lafiel said:
.....
I'm sorry all i can say is lol.
:p

Suck it, Lafiel.
 

tiff

Banned
RurouniZel said:
I enjoyed it minus the couple of needless fanservice shots in Ep. 3 and 4. It's Ep 15 that I didn't like because it's making it seem like Kyousuke wants to bone his sister, and I preferred it back when it was (in my eyes anyway) about a brother and sister slowly becoming a part of each other's lives again after some sort of fallout between them. I thought that dynamic was rather touching, and maybe it's just bad scripting/directing on this final episode's part, but if that's the direction it's going in then meh. :/
To be honest I couldn't quite figure out what Kyousuke was after in that episode. At first he seems reasonable enough, he's worried about her so he goes to check up on her, then he's all "Let's play eroge!" and after that...
 
Eden of the East
Well that was quite an ending. And tons of exposition dump near the ending. I Don't get what Takizawa needed all the NEETs for if he just had to shoot down the missiles. Doesn't take crowd sourcing to figure out a plan like that. Wonder what he meant by become the King of Japan at the end. And how could he buy something like with even 10 billion yen. Guess its time to watch the movie and see where this goes.
 

Jerk

Banned
RurouniZel said:
I enjoyed it minus the couple of needless fanservice shots in Ep. 3 and 4. It's Ep 15 that I didn't like because it's making it seem like Kyousuke wants to bone his sister, and I preferred it back when it was (in my eyes anyway) about a brother and sister slowly becoming a part of each other's lives again after some sort of fallout between them. I thought that dynamic was rather touching, and maybe it's just bad scripting/directing on this final episode's part, but if that's the direction it's going in then meh. :/

Still, Taketatsu Ayano's voice is lovely, no matter the role! ^_^

You are very cute.
 

zeroshiki

Member
Hellsing321 said:
Eden of the East
Well that was quite an ending. And tons of exposition dump near the ending. I Don't get what Takizawa needed all the NEETs for if he just had to shoot down the missiles. Doesn't take crowd sourcing to figure out a plan like that. Wonder what he meant by become the King of Japan at the end. And how could he buy something like with even 10 billion yen. Guess its time to watch the movie and see where this goes.

Movies? What movies? There are no movies.

Don't lie to me Hellsing.
 

Articalys

Member
I, uh... huh?

Viz Media Announces Product License for Hot New Anime Action Series Tiger & Bunny

Viz Media, LLC (Viz Media), the largest distributor and licensor of anime and manga in North America, has announced it has been named the exclusive U.S. product licensor for the new animated crime-fighting action series TIGER & BUNNY. The company will showcase the property to a variety of potential merchandise partners during the 2011 Licensing International Expo, held in Las Vegas, June 14th-16th, 2011. Viz Media will be located in Booth #2481.

The Licensing International Expo is held at Mandalay Bay Convention Center and is the preeminent marketplace for the hottest international brands and properties. The vent features a show floor of more than 7,000 properties from all of Hollywood's major film studios, global entertainment companies, Fortune 500 consumer brands, sporting teams, interactive properties, fashion labels, and cutting-edge artists and designers. The annual event celebrated its 30th Anniversary in 2010.

TIGER & BUNNY currently simulcasts the same day it debuts in Japan on HULU and VIZAnime.com, the company's own exclusive web destination for anime. TIGER & BUNNY Blu-ray currently rank Number 1 on Amazon Japan, and a wide variety of toys, collectables, and other products are already licensed for the Japanese market.

“We're very excited to participate again at the Licensing International Expo, and this year we'll showcase TIGER & BUNNY, a new series that has been the subject of tremendous buzz among fan circles,” says Tracy Hanchett, Director, Consumer Products. “With its multi-textured characters and unique blend of comedy and over the top action, the TIGER & BUNNY brand is ideally suited to a range of product merchandising options across all categories for the key male 14-25 demographic. We look forward to meeting with leading product partners at the show to explore the exciting range of possibilities for this hot new property.”

So... it's not a DVD license, but what is it?
 

Jex

Member
hosannainexcelsis said:
It's not that the show took a sudden downturn in the latest episode, it's just that the show's problems have been gradually getting worse and worse over the past couple episodes and this one reached the limit of my patience.
As I mentioned earlier, there was a build up to some fairly major events this season which the show then instantly resolved/stopped caring about.
 
Hidan no Aria Loli vs. Yandere 06:

Aw. I guess J.C. Staff blew a bunch of budget the last couple episodes. So now we get Aria and Hotogi fighting each other for the affections of James Bond Hysteria Mode Kinji. This show certainly changes forms at the drop of a hat. First it was tsundere loli hijinks, then it was Loli Speed, then it was Loli Mission Impossible, and now it's a harem show! It just gets better and better!
I liked it more when it was in action movie homage mode.

If the goal is to have a little fanservice for every type of animu fan, I think J.C. Staff are achieving their goal admirably. The whole affair is a lot like a Michael Bay film, it's dumber than a bag of rocks but just so enjoyable you can't help yourself but be dragged along for the ride. I'm not going to say this is the sleeper show of the season, because J.C. Staff still needs to prove to us that they can come up with a decent anime ending, since apparently the light novel series continues for quite a long time after the anime will probably end following the current pacing. But it has entirely surpassed my expectations for it thus far, though to be fair that's not saying a whole lot since I expected absolutely nothing. What I got was hilariously fuck awesome.

Of course, if J.C. Staff likes money, they can just give us another season of this. I would watch it. I'm surprised this is only 13 episodes, it seems like it would be money in the bank drawing interest for them if it was a 26 episodes deal.
 
Hidan no Aria 08 - :lol This show... I shouldn't have doubted this show, it's no IS but Aria is awesomely bad. In this episode, we learn about who the important ancestors of two more characters are. Apparently all of the girls in this show are the descendants of important people. Isn't it convenient how they all (both allies and enemies) just happen to be around this one guy? So convenient...

Also, this episode has the usual fighting and harem antics. Yandere miko girl fights Durandal, who is (shock!) female and a member of the EU evil group that the blonde girl (
and the MC's brother supposedly
) are also members of. Durandal is ...
Jeanne d'Arc the 30th. Jeanne didn't die in that witch burning, that was a double and she actually survived to have children, you see.
Why Durandal (though that's the name of her sword, I'm not sure if that's her name too) would be evil considering who her ancestor is, though, I have no idea... it's kind of odd. The EU sure seem evil from what we know about them, but I'm not entirely sure... we'll see.

This episode has lots of craziness in it though. In addition to that, we also see our hero actually go into Hysteria Mode on purpose, to save Shirayuki after she was tied to the wall and the room was flooded by Durandal. He saves her, but also as always starts talking quite smoothly to both girls. Apparently it's impressive enough that they don't complain that he's saying those things to them while the other is standing next to them and can hear...

And there's a second ancestor reveal as well, as I said. We learn that Shirayuki's clan's secret is that she is an ancestor of...
Himiko, the ancient queen of Japan and the first Japanese ruler whose name we know, thanks to Chinese records. When it said that it was a 2000-year-old family tradition I was thinking that it might be Amaterasu, but no, Himiko... I was close. :) Shirayuki's actual name is something that means Himiko, her other name is a cover.
She's quite good at swordfighting too, and has flame powers. Then, in the battle of west v. east, Shirayuki v. Duradal, the two fight with their unbreakable swords. One guess as to which of them wins...
Hah, as if Europe had any chance compared to perfect Japan? Durandal loses of course, and gets captured when Shirayuki breaks her sword.

So yeah, even though they also continue to fight, the two girls in his direct harem (that is, not counting the evil one(s) for the moment) are getting along a bit better now, after the character building in this episode. It's also good that all three characters have good roles in the fights.

Overall, bad Aria is a horrible show, but now it's definitely in "amusingly bad" territory. It doesn't utterly fail across the board and the characters aren't as interesting so it's no IS, but this is somewhat entertaining stuff at times.
 
Jexhius said:
As I mentioned earlier, there was a build up to some fairly major events this season which the show then instantly resolved/stopped caring about.

I was fine with the
crossdressing
resolution, but then this last episode
completely dropped the firework confrontation; we didn't even see them talk to Menma's father like last episode was hinting at. Instead we got the mother's breakdown. Not what I was hoping for.

cosmicblizzard said:
Sket Dance 9

And the shrinking juice finally shows up. Awesome. Can't wait for its next appearance.

It comes back again? Yes!

Anyone know how many episodes Sket Dance is?
 
hosannainexcelsis said:
I was fine with the
crossdressing
resolution, but then this last episode
completely dropped the firework confrontation; we didn't even see them talk to Menma's father like last episode was hinting at. Instead we got the mother's breakdown. Not what I was hoping for.



It comes back again? Yes!

Anyone know how many episodes Sket Dance is?

Yes it does from another viewpoint.
 
hosannainexcelsis said:
It comes back again? Yes!

Anyone know how many episodes Sket Dance is?

Until they run out of chapters to adapt. Seeing as the manga is still going and this is a WSJ series we're talking about, I hope you're ready to commit to at least a half decade of watching 1 episode a week.
 
Hidan no Aria 07:

I have not witnessed this level of fuck awesome in a long time. Remember the first time you saw Armageddon? Remember at the end, when the music was swelling and Liv Tyler was pouring her heart out to Bruce Willis about how much she loves her daddy over the impossible faster-than-light-speed remote video transmission, and then the screen goes to static, and we have that Michael Bay Dramatic Camera Pullback Shot(tm) where Liv has her hand on the screen and her head bowed? It's kind of like that. 100% pure cheese, 100% pure awesome. It's like going to McDonald's and ordering a Big Mac with Extra Cheese and Extra Special Sauce. The world's best junk food. Fuck, now I"m hungry and shit.
 
Softenni 06-07 - This show is getting better, I think... I like these two episodes better than the first five. Softenni continues to be a quite fanservicey series, of course, but the amount of tennis is increasing, and some rivals have been introduced. That's good, so there will be a sports aspect to this show after all, as well as fanservice and silliness.

In ep. 06, the characters have a match against the people they met in the previous episode. They aren't very good and lose, but the matches are entertaining anyway and they show promise -- and they still insist that they will go to the nationals, despite everything. Also, this episode has the requisite "guy in girls clothes" bit, as the guy our MC met in ep. 5 decides that he likes her so much that he wants to see her again... by dressing as a girl and playing on her team in the match today. This even though he's the manager of that other team. Brilliant idea, guy... but it does lead to some amusing stuff. :)

In episode 7, the girls (and their coach) take a trip up a mountain, heading for a training camp there. They bathe in a hotspring stream, then get attacked by a bear. Kurusu fights a somewhat epic battle against the bear, and gets it to submit to her will. Given that this bear is like 30 or 40 feet tall, that's impressive. :) At the end, we meet a new, stronger rival... see who she is next time.

Street Fighter II V 01-04 - This show... for Street Fighter it sure is bland. Pretty average stuff, watchable but not particularly good or interesting.

Unknown Soldier said:
Hidan no Aria 07:

I have not witnessed this level of fuck awesome in a long time. Remember the first time you saw Armageddon? Remember at the end, when the music was swelling and Liv Tyler was pouring her heart out to Bruce Willis about how much she loves her daddy over the impossible faster-than-light-speed remote video transmission, and then the screen goes to static, and we have that Michael Bay Dramatic Camera Pullback Shot(tm) where Liv has her hand on the screen and her head bowed? It's kind of like that. 100% pure cheese, 100% pure awesome. It's like going to McDonald's and ordering a Big Mac with Extra Cheese and Extra Special Sauce. The world's best junk food. Fuck, now I"m hungry and shit.

Now watch episode 8. It's even better than the 7th one. :)
 
cosmicblizzard said:
Until they run out of chapters to adapt. Seeing as the manga is still going and this is a WSJ series we're talking about, I hope you're ready to commit to at least a half decade of watching 1 episode a week.

That's great news. I was hoping this would be a long-running series but wasn't sure. As long as the quality doesn't dip, Sket Dance is a show I can commit to.
 

Jex

Member
Arjuna 10

Use your words...to make boring things happen. Like have fathers and sons talk.

Also, science is putting cancer in your bacteria.

Fairly tame this week, by episode nine standards.
 

shintoki

sparkle this bitch
Ano Hana 08

COULD DO THAT SHIT 7 EPISODES AGO?

Miri said:
All this Anohana bashing is giving me a headache... has my favorite show of the season finally had a horrible ep?
Its mostly the same voices from the beginning and every episode prior
 

Jex

Member
Arjuna 11

Modern medicine is unnecessary. Most people will get better on their own. Why? Pharmaceutical companies are evil. Modern civilisation is also garbage, which is why SEED exists. Duh.

Also, Juna needs to watch out for her MAN.

Oh, and Chris is dying slowly. Yay!
 

Articalys

Member
Depna 8
Man, how can a show be so awesome for the first 5-6 episodes then take a nosedive right afterwards. Probably since they put the plot on hold to do some "now, here's what this character was doing during the last few episodes" sidestories. At least copious amounts of Meme made this week tolerable.
Also, :lol at Erio's father seriously being named Elliot. I think.

AnoHana 8
DRAMA
Actually, I guess I'm just less cynical than the lot of you as I didn't think it was that bad. But yes, the previous lack of any
object-manipulation techniques to prove Menma's ghostly existence
kind of hit hard here.
At least sad characters actually look and sound sad. A couple shows I've seen recently had scenes where characters were supposed to be bawling their eyes out but the animation just appeared to make them mildly upset.
 
A Black Falcon said:
Now watch episode 8. It's even better than the 7th one. :)

Okay then!

Hidan no Aria 08:

Ahahahaha...wow. Just, wow. This whole show is very much the classic example of a 'blender anime'. The most shining example of that is of course Code Geass. Just throw a bunch of shit at the wall and see what sticks. In this episode, we've got girls fighting each other with magical swords, calling out your attacks shounen style, a trap involving drowning your target with a rising water level, even more Hysteria Mode James Bond shit, and a final battle sequence that could have been ripped straight out of Naruto or Bleach or any other shounen anime.

Meanwhile everybody is trying to one-up the previous person by revealing another ridiculous ancestry, so far we have
Aria Holmes Kanzaki IV, the great-granddaughter of Sherlock Holmes, Riko Mine Lupin IV, the great-granddaughter of Arsene Lupin, Jeanne D'Arc the 30th, who wields Roland's legendary sword Durandal and has the power of ice breath, and Shirayuki Hotogi Himiko, a direct-line descendent of Himiko, who wields a magical sword which she can enchant with fire to become a +1 Katana of Flaming Flames.
It almost makes you feel sorry for poor Kinji, who only has a boring Harem Sex God Mode as his super power which he activates by kissing his harem members on the lips. Almost. I kind of hope that later on Kinji reveals his Hysteria Mode is a result of being a direct descendent of Tokugawa Ieyasu or some shit, because right now Kinji is totally being left out on this ridiculous ancestry angle.

I really feel at this point that this show is only short of being a Legendary Anime like Code Geass on a few points: first, the budget is much much lower, second, it's based on a light novel instead of making up it's ridiculous and fuck awesome shit on the fly, and third and most importantly, no one person in this show is as awesome as Lelouch was. Oh well, it's my fuck awesome sleeper anime of the season so far and that's the story I'm sticking with.

Trivia: Riko's real name
Riko Mine Lupin IV is evidently an intentional shout out to Lupin III, since it implies that she is the daughter of Arsene Lupin III and Fujiko Mine.
 

Jex

Member
Arunja 12 - How can you watch this when children are starving?

So Japan is made out of plastic, which gets eaten. So much for that whole country.

Juna tries her best resolve this crisis by sleeping/sitting in a bed. Neat.

Do you remember oil, kids? It's bad.

Juna gets a mech.

I can't even mock this show or write eruditely on it, I'm down to merely regurgitating plot events in chronological order.
 
A Black Falcon said:
And there's a second ancestor reveal as well, as I said. We learn that Shirayuki's clan's secret is that she is an ancestor of...
Himiko, the ancient queen of Japan and the first Japanese ruler whose name we know, thanks to Chinese records. When it said that it was a 2000-year-old family tradition I was thinking that it might be Amaterasu, but no, Himiko... I was close. :) Shirayuki's actual name is something that means Himiko, her other name is a cover.

Trivia of the evening: Only the royal families of Japan ever claimed divine descent from Amaterasu, much like the ancient Egyptian Pharaohs who claimed to be the living incarnations of Horus (or alternately, after the Fifth Kingdom, the sons of Ra). Therefore in order for
Shirayuki
to claim she was a descendant of Amaterasu, she would first have to claim to be a member of the Japanese royal family. This is all an entirely pointless clarification in a anime populated by fictional characters who claim to be the descendants of fictional characters, but it was interesting enough to me that I thought I'd say a few words about it.

Not trivia: I really like listening to the full versions of Hidan no Aria's OP and ED.
 

jman2050

Member
Arjuna 11-13

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2mx3nmc.jpg
 
Arjuna 10-13 - I thought the first half of this series was reasonably interesting, and the second half had some good points as well -- humanity, and modern civilization, IS doing a lot of bad things to the world. It could indeed lead to a really bad end result; at the rate we're going that seems to look more and more likely all the time. However, this show just has so many problems that it's quite easy to see why people wouldn't pay attention to the good aspects of the message. First, even when it has a good point to make, often it takes a more clearly defined, but less accurate, approach towards solving it. Second, sometimes it says things that are just stupid and wrong, like that a polar switch would extinguish life on earth. That is absolutely false. (Also, the focus on destroying Japan first sure shows that this is Japanese... why DO they always have disasters destroy their own country in their fiction anyway...) And also, the magical component isn't exactly helpful towards the environmental message really.

This really was highlighted by the ending, which was really, REALLY bad. There are other problems as well though, including a lot of tedium, characters which often are hard to like, the complete disaster of fact and opinion that was episode 9, and the aforementioned misaimed elements of the criticism (Yes, the Japanese education system has problems. No, the approach this show takes towards solving them isn't helpful. Yes, communication is difficult. No, Chris railing against using names and stuff is not exactly going to help people understand how to communicate. Etc.). Because of those elements it was pretty hard to watch four episodes of this in a row, it was so uninteresting a lot of the time... and then the payoff was AWFUL because of how bad that ending was. Really, it's hard to imagine a worse ending than that...

JUNA BECOMES THE NEXT CHRIS.
GAH! No! Bad! I'd have rather seen the "everyone in Japan dies" ending than that! I don't even want to get into it, it's just so horribly stupid and wrong... :(

It's a very Japanese ending though, would anyone else have had the show end that way? As I've said above though, that is as much criticism as praise... but either way, it's true.

Unknown Soldier said:
Trivia of the evening: Only the royal families of Japan ever claimed divine descent from Amaterasu, much like the ancient Egyptian Pharaohs who claimed to be the living incarnations of Horus (or alternately, after the Fifth Kingdom, the sons of Ra). Therefore in order for
Shirayuki
to claim she was a descendant of Amaterasu, she would first have to claim to be a member of the Japanese royal family. This is all an entirely pointless clarification in a anime populated by fictional characters who claim to be the descendants of fictional characters, but it was interesting enough to me that I thought I'd say a few words about it.
Oh, right, yeah, that is true. They could have done it though, have her be from some ex-branch of the royal family... it'd have been more believable actually, because the royal family actually exists for sure. Descendants of Himiko? As far as I know no one has the slightest clue of any such people.

On that note, it is a funny mix; Holmes and Lupin are fictional, but Himiko and Jeanne are real people...

Unknown Soldier said:
Okay then!

Hidan no Aria 08:

Ahahahaha...wow. Just, wow. This whole show is very much the classic example of a 'blender anime'. The most shining example of that is of course Code Geass. Just throw a bunch of shit at the wall and see what sticks. In this episode, we've got girls fighting each other with magical swords, calling out your attacks shounen style, a trap involving drowning your target with a rising water level, even more Hysteria Mode James Bond shit, and a final battle sequence that could have been ripped straight out of Naruto or Bleach or any other shounen anime.
Yeah, it's a pretty crazy show indeed... tossing in action-show ripoff scene after action-show ripoff scene with letups only for generic harem scenes, this show is just tossing a lot of stuff at the screen and hoping people are entertained, isn't it. And it's working...

Meanwhile everybody is trying to one-up the previous person by revealing another ridiculous ancestry, so far we have
Aria Holmes Kanzaki IV, the great-granddaughter of Sherlock Holmes, Riko Mine Lupin IV, the great-granddaughter of Arsene Lupin, Jeanne D'Arc the 30th, who wields Roland's legendary sword Durandal and has the power of ice breath, and Shirayuki Hotogi Himiko, a direct-line descendent of Himiko, who wields a magical sword which she can enchant with fire to become a +1 Katana of Flaming Flames.
It almost makes you feel sorry for poor Kinji, who only has a boring Harem Sex God Mode as his super power which he activates by kissing his harem members on the lips. Almost. I kind of hope that later on Kinji reveals his Hysteria Mode is a result of being a direct descendent of Tokugawa Ieyasu or some shit, because right now Kinji is totally being left out on this ridiculous ancestry angle.
Well, Jeanne 30 had Durandal until Shirayuki broke it with her power of Japanese people being superior to outsiders, anyway... but otherwise, yeah.

Also, I agree, Kinji's being left out... I hope he has some ridiculous ancestor connection as well.

I really feel at this point that this show is only short of being a Legendary Anime like Code Geass on a few points: first, the budget is much much lower, second, it's based on a light novel instead of making up it's ridiculous and fuck awesome shit on the fly, and third and most importantly, no one person in this show is as awesome as Lelouch was. Oh well, it's my fuck awesome sleeper anime of the season so far and that's the story I'm sticking with.
Lelouch did some bad things though, hopefully these heroes won't do evil stuff like he did a few times.

Trivia: Riko's real name
Riko Mine Lupin IV is evidently an intentional shout out to Lupin III, since it implies that she is the daughter of Arsene Lupin III and Fujiko Mine.
Quite true, I'm sure.
 

Izayoi

Banned
A Black Falcon said:
Lelouch did some bad things though, hopefully these heroes won't do evil stuff like he did a few times.
That's part of what made him so interesting, though.

Someone who's good to a fault is boring.
 
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