The manga's all about pointless edge, so going against the grain in a dumb way fits it. Plus the rotoscoping makes some later scenes simply amazing, even if it makes some other scenes look like crap. I like how Shuzo Oshimi approved of the rotoscoping while saying "those who go 'Nakamura-san, unf unf' will feel betrayed".
Oshimi's newest work just got picked up by Kodansha USA. It's pretty good, I'd recommend checking it out along with the Flowers of Evil manga if you get the chance.
I'm sure if Oshimi could've done it like in the right originally, he would have. His manga look like they look because well, that's the way of drawing he has and it works for him. But Nagahama's vision is definitely better suited to the kind of content found in his stories .
Just finished watching "Der Film" and I thought it was really well made. It was like a action sandwhich with the pacing. All the characters got their chance to shine and all the tank battles looked great with 3D help.
Not only did the movie fully flesh itself out but it took me through a range of emotions no "moe girls in tanks" should ever do. I was invested, worried, joyful, laughing, and very well entertained.
Oshimi's newest work just got picked up by Kodansha USA. It's pretty good, I'd recommend checking it out along with the Flowers of Evil manga if you get the chance.
Quoting simply because I quite enjoyed the unusual art style and psychological edge that the Flowers of Evil anime had and thought it was a shame how they ended it, felt premature in a way. I should probably check out the manga to get my fill
Ah. Yup. Crazy Nina is back. She's a bit much at this point, but I guess a little crazy every now and then is a little entertaining.
There is a lot happening in these two episodes. The government for the Chinese Federation seems to screw themselves every time they think they have the upper hand. Lelouch's plan seemed a little flimsy from the get go and it cost him
Colin
. So...not the best plan he's ever concocted.
Also the ending of episode 10 threw me for a loop.
Is he not on the ship? Why is he at school? What the heck is going on?
Neon Genesis Evangelion 6
You know, I was indifferent to Rei, but by the end of the episode I am kind of warming up to her. And Shinji seems to at least be kind of coming into his own. This episode felt fast, which I am 100% okay with. Keep it up Evangelion.
-Third season of Garo anime is being worked on. No details yet.
-Writer for Divine Flame, Kobayashi, was told by producers to bring German back because he was such a popular character and so she struggled to come up with a good reason. She had a lot of difficulty
killing him off the first time so she wasn't exactly enthused about bringing him back
. In Maruyama's words, "Producers don't give a fuck about things like scripts".
Third season eh. Excited but Crimson Moon did poison the well a bit for me.
Surprisingly candid about thei frustrations. That German thing really pisses me off, being made to bend towards something because its popular rather than what they actually wanted to do.
That list putting Hyouka as Ishidate's reference credit makes it seem like he directed it (he did 3 episodes), when it was Takemoto. Kyoukai no Kanata was directed by Ishidate. I agree with your comment though. Nobody could have salvaged KnK's script so I'd like to see him on something better.
It's one of the few shows to give me anxiety while I watched it from the events that unfolded. I couldn't really watch more than an episode at a time after a certain point.
As I suspected this series has gotten a lot more tolerable now that it is focusing on people not named Deku or Bakugo at times. Indeed, the main focus is on Tenya Iida who is very clearly one day going to be the accountant to the UA one day. Outside of that, the media seems to have camped outside campus in order to get a statement from All Might. I wonder if there is a formal class on media relations as that is one of the cardinal things a superhero has to deal with. Hell, it looks like the teaching staff could use a lesson on that one. Anyway, the upshot was the beginning of rescue training but it looks the sceenwriters heard the actual wishes of the audience and had some actual villains appear.
the movie seeeeems to expect me to know who these characters are. Don't be a dingus. I'm not media illiterate mate.
/edit on second thoughts my phrasing was unclear. There are indeed characters who are new. There are also characters who are new to me who are apparently not worthy of getting an actual 'introduction' as characters, leading me to think I may have skipped some OVAs.
Alrighty then, now the show is really hitting its stride.
Episode 5 is one long battle sequence - a complete contrast to the previous episode. It's pretty awesome as well, with the five girls fighting together for the first time against overwhelming enemy numbers. All my praise for the battles thus far - great visual variety, style, animation etc - apply here, only this time for the whole episode. These aspects are taken to eleven when the powerups are used, leading to some spectacular sequences.
I am a little perplexed as to the ease of the use of the powerups, but I know it serves a purpose. The next three episodes deal with the effects that the fighting has had on all the girls:
loss of voice, taste, sight etc
. While these are obviously pretty bad, the show retains a saccharine tone with the girls generally being happy and content with things. They go to a beach, an onsen, a restaurant etc, and it's fun to watch these characters just breathe.
What the show does really well during these moments is keep the nagging feeling that something it out of place, despite all the outward happiness. This is done through small changes in facial expressions, silence and apparently throwaway lines. There is a sequence -
where Togo reveals that she lost her memory after the accident
- that is presented as the character just thinking about the past.
What happens in Episode 8 puts an entireky different slant on everything that has happened before. After 7 episodes dominated by positivity, the nagging feeling that the show has done so well to maintain comes out in full force.
Reveal in spoilers:
Yuna and Togo discover that they're fated to fight while continuously losing parts of themselves.
The sight of Sonoko, who is almost entirely crippled, hammers the point home: The Hero System reduces the girls to sacrificial lambs who will continue to fight until they literally have nothing else to give. Sonoko is trapped in her hospital bed, and finds no comfort in the godly admiratiom that the masked and silent Taisha have for her.
What makes this reveal so effective for me isn't just the visuals. It's the timing. That this all comes to lighy after the main girkls win a fight in "overtime" really helps to sell the reality that these girls are in a way doomed to fight and thus doomed to lose themselves.
It's an excellently done reveal in almost all aspects for me.
This batch of episodes for me are very strong. The characters are likeable and engaging, the fight scenes are stylish and memorable, and the animation is generally strong. But for me the greatest aspect of these episodes os the carefully considered tone: it keeps things light while at the same time retaining a feeling of unease - which makes the reveal all the stronger for me.
Just really good stuff. Looking forward to finishing it tonight, even if I've heard bad things about the ending.
I'm sure if Oshimi could've done it like in the right originally, he would have. His manga look like they look because well, that's the way of drawing he has and it works for him. But Nagahama's vision is definitely better suited to the kind of content found in his stories .
I'd say that big part of the dissonance is also a simple age difference, Oshimi was drawing what was supposed to be Middle Schoolers (or whatever the stage before high school is called in Japan) Nagahama picked up actors who looked way older then that.
Girls und Panzer Movie First 15 minutes
T-34 shrugs of a 88mm shell on its frontal plate from the range of 25 meters. Absolutely dropped.
And 2 hours long run time, who the hell thought it was a good idea.
the movie seeeeems to expect me to know who these characters are. Don't be a dingus. I'm not media illiterate mate.
/edit on second thoughts my phrasing was unclear. There are indeed characters who are new. There are also characters who are new to me who are apparently not worthy of getting an actual 'introduction' as characters, leading me to think I may have skipped some OVAs.
Yeah, I was wondering if there was another OVA episode featuring the Finns that came out or something. They seem just "there" and not as integrated as the new Japanese team.
I'd say that big part of the dissonance is also a simple age difference, Oshimi was drawing what was supposed to Middle Schoolers (or whatever the stage before high school is called in Japan) Nagahama picked up actors who looked way older then that.
I'm sure if Oshimi could've done it like in the right originally, he would have. His manga look like they look because well, that's the way of drawing he has and it works for him. But Nagahama's vision is definitely better suited to the kind of content found in his stories .
Also remember that Oshimi's art at the beginning of the Flowers of Evil manga is straight-up bad. Just laughable. But by the end of Flowers of Evil and with his more recent manga, especially Happiness, his art has become incredibly refined and creative. It's one of the greatest artistic transformations I've seen.
The Flowers of Evil anime, while rotoscoping makes it its own thing, is closer to Oshimi's later style, which features more realistic looking characters, than his earlier style from the manga chapters the anime adapted.
It's not, but she doesn't actually say the game titles in the dialogue. She's like "She probably likes those games where you become an idol, or collect monsters, or collect yokais..." It's obvious what they're talking about, but it's still not cool to violate copyright apparently!
It's not, but she doesn't actually say the game titles in the dialogue. She's like "She probably likes those games where you become an idol, or collect monsters, or collect yokais..." It's obvious what they're talking about, but it's still not cool to violate copyright apparently!
I don't know why, but I find it funny that even Japan has the whole "casual" vs "hardcore" thing in games. Funny thing is that here, being into idol games would make you hardcore.
That was a whole boatload of fun. The story has never been dumber and more excuse-plot but there was so many absolutely ludicrous action sequences that were well-directed and knew how to keep the tension going that it's difficult to really fault it for anything (apart from the long meandering slog between the 'prologue' battle and the bulk of the movie where they hastily justify the show's central conflict, which I still found moderately entertaining if just for the glimpse into the bizarre state of the world.)
I agree though, fuck MEXT.
That prologue fight was legimately really exciting even though there were zero stakes. I'm really amazed at the way they can have such wafer-thin characterisation and yet somehow manage to make every character in their own way likable. It's probably because it's ultimately such a positive, upbeat show about being an utter tank nerd, it's only when it pretends to larger things where it starts to get a bit weary.
The Ferris Wheel, the Rollercoaster, ANZO being completely fucking nuts, Saunders with the heavy-duty airdrop plane (though in the main fight they went out like punks), the fucking bunker buster mobile artillery sequence, and the 5-minute silent sequence near the end with just the two tanks v Centurion and the fps shots were realy shout-out moments. Also the ludicrous wild west bits when they broke into the set. Christ. What a movie.
I really, really want some kind of spaceship movie from them, but a) probably way less earning potential, and b) not as much fun stuff you can do with environments in space I think. That said though... warp drives!
Oh, I forgot to mention: the GirlPan movie deserves special attention for making its really complex tank battles really easy for a casual viewer to follow. I only got lost maybe once or twice because I kept pausing to write up some quick thoughts or check my phone or something.
/edit while it's fresh in my mind the sound mixing was ALSO incredible. Lots of incredible tiny noises, really impactful explosions, the no-voice sequence near the climax probably illustrates this the best but they paid a LOT of attention to it throughout. Keep your ears open.
