• Title: True Tears
• Studio: PA Works
• Genre: Romance

Ratings (out of 5):

• Story: ♥♥½

• Animation: ♥♥♥½
• Characters: ♥♥
• OP/ED Themes: ♥♥♥
• Overall: ♥♥½ (Okay, but…WTF is this shit?)

Thoughts:
Okay, let’s see how much of this I managed to get straight. Shinichiro belongs to a family that does traditional Japanese dance (Mugiha), but he wants to draw manga. He also lives with a hot chick named Hiromi, the daughter of his dad’s deceased friend, who he kinda has a crush on. But she keeps herself separate from the family.

Then one day he meets a transfer student who is stuck up a tree. She drags him to a chicken coop and tells him that one of the chickens wants to fly and the other doesn’t. She also tells Shinichiro that he doesn’t want to fly either. He makes some comment about how she can fly ’cause she’s an airhead, and she curses him.

Life doesn’t get any betterafter that : he has a rough dance class, and he accidentally walks in on Hiromi about to take a bath. So he grabs a tissue box and…makes a chicken out of it as an offering to the strange girl, Noe. Then his remarkably young-looking mother opens a rejection letter from a manga publisher, causing some family havoc.

He gets to school and offers the chicken thing to Noe, and she drags him to the coop again, where it turns out that the bird she liked has been eaten by a racoon. She yells at the other chicken to tell her what happened. She and Shinichiro officially introduce themselves to each other, and he sees her in the light of a sunset, and..that’s the end of the episode.

I guess Noe is supposed to be charmingly eccentric, but I kinda think she’s just batshit insane. I don’t find her very cute, though I know I’m supposed to. Honestly, I just feel perplexed by her. And I feel a bit sorry for Shinichiro for being such a spineless pansy.

And yet, to be fair, I keep hearing about how popular the series is already, so there may just be something about it I’m completely missing. And I do feel intrigued enough to watch a second episode, to be sure…if only to see if I can make more sense of it. But yeah, I just felt confused, and not in an amusing way like with Zetsubou, which feels intentional, but more of a “…no, seriously, what am I missing?” way.

• Title: Ookami to Koushinryou (Wolf and Spice)
• Studio: IMAGIN
• Genre: Fantasy/Adventure

Ratings (out of 5):

• Story: ♥♥♥♥

• Animation: ♥♥♥♥
• Characters: ♥♥♥
• OP/ED Themes: ♥♥♥♥
• Overall: ♥♥♥♥ (Solid animation, interesting story, unique world setting for an anime, naked wolfgirls…sold!)

Thoughts:
The merchant Lawrence arrives in a small town just in time for its annual festival celebrating the harvest and dedicating it to the local wolf god– a tradition perhaps no longer believed in, but celebrated nonetheless. There, he finds himself assaulted by two women: one a merchant-in-training who he’s known for some time who offers a “partnership,” and the other the aforementioned wolf god.

In the end, Lawrence finds himself abandoning the merchant girl and taking the wolf god on a journey, which will be the subject of the rest of the series.

The first thing that surprised me the most about this series is that none of the main characters look young. In fact, Lawrence could be considered a little on the old side. He’s probably at least 30– practically ancient in anime-land. The wolf god, Horo, is hundreds of years old and looks early 20s-ish; same with Chloe, the merchant.

The second thing that surprised me is that it’s set in a world vaguely like western Europe in the late middle ages, something you don’t see too often in anime. Horo is still a Japanese-style god, however; more like a youkai than an all-powerful being.

We see reference in the first episode to the village’s celebration being a “pagan” one and that they aren’t devoted enough to the “one true religion,” which could become a really interesting conflict in the rest of the series.

But even if it’s a relatively peaceful slice-of-life journey sort of thing, I think it’ll still be a lot of fun. I definitely recommend picking this one up.

• Title: Hatenkou Yugi (roughly: “Novel Games” or “Unprecedented Games.” That’s novel as in unique/new, natch.)
• Studio: Deen
• Genre: Adventure

Ratings (out of 5):

• Story: ♥♥♥

• Animation: ♥♥½
• Characters: ♥♥♥♥
• OP/ED Themes: ♥♥♥
• Overall: ♥♥♥½ (A little clunky, but Rahzel will pull it together, because that’s just what she does.)

Thoughts:
Rahzel is a young magic-user who has been kicked out of her home by her eccentric father, who decided that she needed to go on a journey to see the world. As in, he decided it one morning, and kicked her out by that afternoon.

In short order she snags two guys to accompany her: Alzeid, a white-haired, red-eyed stoic-type (with the occasional sarcastic flair) who is seeking revenge for his father, and Baroqueheat, a flirtatious dude with a butterfly tattoo on his right hand. See, guys? Now THAT is a man who is comfortable with his sexuality.

The manga that this series is based on (released in English by TOKYOPOP as Dazzle), will feature short stories and short arcs revolving around the three adventurers and their, uh, adventures, with little overarching plot (and I’m 6 volumes in). With each tale you learn a little bit more about the three characters’ backgrounds and how they came to be who they are, why they’re traveling and why they continue to travel in this particular group.

I’m not sure if the anime will take this tack or if they’ll build up into a short arc to use as the climax, or even just make up their own thing. I hope it’s the former, though; I like the just-barely-slice-of-life feel of the manga. In that regard, it’s a little bit like Slayers TV, if you cut off the second half of any season (you know, the half that has the actual plot). A group of wanderers with interesting psychoses just making their way through their world.

Now, this anime adaptation is NOT a high-budget deal. The animation is a little stiff, and the mouth/voice sync is a little weak too. I’m also not too fond of Baroqueheat’s design; something about his face looks too small for his head. (I also think he and to a lesser extent Alzeid are a little too bulky and muscular.)

I also hate the outfit they use as Rahzel’s main clothing in the OP/ED and in this episode. I don’t usually care too much about fashion in anime, but in the manga her clothes were a very obvious outlet for mangaka Minari Endoh’s skills, and I wish that showed through a bit more in the anime…the outfits in both episodes I’ve watched so far* were lame. I especially hate those dorky little hats. Blech.

I do like the voice acting quite a bit though. Rahzel is voiced by Sanae Kobayashi (Elfen Lied’s Lucy, D.Gray-Man’s Allen Walker), who I hope is ushering in an era of female leads who don’t have super-high-pitched cutesy voices along with Shugo Chara!’s lead actress, newcomver Kanae Itou. Rahzel is an anti-moe character; she’s strong and she knows it and she’ll be damned if she depends on anyone else for help…except at the same time, she’ll send the boys to do errands if they let her. She doesn’t put up with anyone’s whiney bullshit and never seriously projects her own, which is something that I can get behind in a female anime character. (Not that she doesn’t make plenty of righteous speeches, but they usually tend to be along the “…get over your emo self!” vein.)

Alzeid is voiced by Takahiro Sakurai, a.k.a. Code Geass‘ Suzaku and Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children’s Cloud. Alzeid is much more like Cloud than Suzaku, both in voice and character, natch, and Sakurai does a good job of making him both somewhat monotone and NOT boring. Baroqueheat– not that you see much of him in the first ep –is voiced by Shinichiro Miki, who played Kurz Weber in Full Metal Panic! and Takumi in Initial D, among others. He does a good job with Baroqueheat’s playfulness, but I’m reserving judgment until we get some of the character’s backstory and more serious moments.

Now, here’s where I have to set aside my bias– I really like the manga –and say that in all honestly, I think most people would find this show to be a decent, but not excellent, fantasy adventure story, judging by the first ep or two. The animation quality is definitely not high, and the plot so far isn’t all that interesting. If you like the characters, they’ll propel you through the first two eps, to be sure. So I’m crossing my fingers that the show will solidify more as it goes on.

* Okay, fine, I watched two episodes. Shut up.

• Title: Kimi ga Aruji De, Shitsuji ga Ore De (roughly, “You’re the Master, I’m the Butler”)
• Studio: ACGT
• Genre: Romantic Comedy/Harem

Ratings (out of 5):

• Story: ♥♥½

• Animation: ♥♥½
• Characters: ♥♥♥½
• OP/ED Themes: ♥♥♥
• Overall: ♥♥♥½ (Smexy and funny FTW.)

Thoughts:
In the first couple of minutes of this show, I jumped to an early conclusion: mediocre Hayate no Gotoku ripoff.

By the end of the show, my actual conclusion was: halfway decent Hayate no Gotoku ripoff.

So! The show is about Ren and Hato, a pair of siblings (with matching sibling complexes, no less) who have run away from their abusive alcoholic father. They run to the big city and try to find jobs, and thanks to a series of goofy accidents are able to find work as a maid and butler in the Kuonji house, working for three sisters: bitchy, cute-thing-loving Shinra; reluctant loli Miyu, and the jokingly unremarkable Yume (whose lack of an interesting character trait IS her character trait, so far). Also in the house are a crew of goofy maids and butlers, including a delicious trap. Well, he’s not technically dressed like a girl, but he looks and sounds like a girl, so it’s close enough.

In spite of Ren and Hato’s un-joke-like history, the show is absolute comedy, and considerably funnier than I was expecting. There was even a reference to Kuso Miso Technique (if you don’t know, you don’t want to know), as well as plenty of other meta jokes about character roles and the like.

The things that made the impression early on were a scene very reminiscent of the HnG opening, in which Hayate stands in front of a dark background while the narrator talks about what makes a good butler (in Kimi ga Aruji de, Ren stands in front of a dark background and does battle with the chief butler, who tells him what makes a good butler)…and Miyu’s character design: blonde with two pigtails. And during her introduction, a particular thing happens that I’ve juxtaposed next to a similar thing in HnG:

Oh, and a random note: Ren has weird marks under his eyes kinda like Naruto. Yeah, I don’t get it either.

The anime’s past life as an eroge is made clear pretty early on, and fans who didn’t like HnG’s devotion to, for the most part, delicious flat chests will be happy to see plenty of bazongas in Kimi ga Aruji.

Other than that: the art, animation, and music are all pretty mediocre. Not bad, mind, just not really outstanding in any way.

Overall though, better than I expected. We’ll see how it goes!

• Title: Persona -Trinity Soul-
• Studio: A-1 Pictures
• Genre: Action

Ratings (out of 5):

• Story: ♥♥♥♥

• Animation: ♥♥♥♥
• Characters: ♥♥♥
• OP/ED Themes: ♥♥♥♥
• Overall: ♥♥♥♥ (Definitely keeping up on this one.)

Thoughts:
Ahh, the much-anticipated anime sequel to the game Persona 3. I should note that I’ve never played the game, so I can’t really talk too much about how it ties in there.

But that aside, this is a really well-crafted first episode, with enough exposition that the audience understands what’s going on without it feeling too heavy in dialogue. The art style is excellent and the animation quality is pretty good too.

So, the plot sum-up so far? Shin and his younger brother Jun– who also used to have a twin sister named Yuki –arrive in town where they’re supposed to meet their older brother Ryou, who is a chief of police. Unfortunately, Ryou is dealing with his current case: a series of murders in which the victims were turned inside out. Before too long it becomes clear that there’s some sort of supernatural force involved, though it isn’t made clear in this episode, natch.

I do have a few minor complaints, the primary being the music. Not that there’s anything wrong with any of the music itself; in fact, the BGM and OP/ED are really pretty excellent. But the amount of music sometimes felt like overkill– the first scene featured some opera and then background music that felt like it was from a Tim Burton flick. During the bit with the opera I felt like I wished there was eerie silence instead. During a later scene, there’s some badass action music while Ryou drives to a crime scene, which provided a sense of urgency nicely but was played up a bit much for the actual action that was happening (i.e. Ryou driving a car).

The other complaint actually wore off as I got used to it: the facial movements are very minimal, which is unusual in an anime.

I look forward to hearing more about this supernatural mystery– and getting to know the characters better.

• Title: Zoku Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei
• Studio: SHAFT
• Genre: Dark Comedy

Ratings (out of 5):

• Story: If you can call this “story,” it gets ♥♥♥

• Animation: ♥♥♥½
• Characters: ♥♥♥♥
• OP/ED Themes: ♥♥♥
• Overall: ♥♥♥♥ (Hang me baby, one more time.)

Thoughts:
Those of you who watched the first season of Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei, all you need know is that so far, the new season makes even less sense.

For those who skipped over the first season…I recommend watching it before getting into season two because it shifts into its surreal humor a bit more gradually. The second season doesn’t just pick up where season one left off in its weirdness; it takes a great leap forward.

That said, it’s still really funny. In this episode we get the extremely-belated introduction of Hito Nami, a.k.a. “the normal girl.” An introduction to all the previously-introduced characters is provided in the process, as well as some more fun with Kafuka (the optimist) and Komori (the hikikomori). Woot woot.

The OP and ED are good, but not as good as the previous season, and if you really pay attention to them they really feel like a poor man’s version of the first season’s OP/ED– they were trying to replicate the feel and awesomeness without simply duplicating, and I don’t think they succeeded in that.

The animation starts out looking a bit different, but by the end of the episode we’re back to the style we’re used to for this show.

So, there you have it: If you liked the first season of SZS, you’ll like the second season. If you didn’t, you probably won’t. If you haven’t seen any, I recommend the first season before this, but in terms of understanding the characters and setting, you can jump right into the new season…providing you completely ignore the first five or so minutes of the episode. ♥

• Title: H2O ~footprints in the sand~
• Studio: ZEXCS
• Genre: Romance

Ratings (out of 5):

• Story: ♥♥♥♥

• Animation: ♥♥½
• Characters: ♥♥♥
• OP/ED Themes: ♥♥½
• Overall: ♥♥♥ (In the first minute, a chick gets punched in the face. I’m so there!)

Thoughts:
Hmm, I don’t quite know what I was expecting from this show, but it wasn’t this. The male lead, Takuma, is blind (which of course doesn’t stop the fanservice one bit) as well as being a Really Nice Guy. The female lead, Kohinata, is something of a tsundere– with a lot more tsuntsun than deredere for now. And why not? She gets the crap beaten out of her by her schoolmates for no obvious reason. So right now she’s kind of like a feral cat, who will probably be tamed into something of an affectionate house pet by the end of the show.

The other female lead, Hinata, seems to know Takuma already via some family connection. She’s nice and sweet, though not nice or sweet enough to a) tell Takuma whatever she may know about him, b) help out Kohinata. And there’s another prominent female character, Otoha, a mischevious girl who claims to be a spirit and tells Takuma he’s the Promised One. And a cast of other over-the-top characters…all female, except for two henchboys with amazingly obnoxious voices.

That’s all we’ve really got so far, except that there is a possibility of Takuma being able to see. This isn’t my genre, but I’m curious about why everyone treats Kohinata like shit (even the teacher!), so I’ll keep watching. Besides, I can’t quite tell how much of this show will be character-driven comedy and how much will be plot-driven drama– I’d say this first episode leans a bit more towards the drama, but then, it has to set up the story.

The art and animation are all pretty average, by the way, as are the OVAs. The characters…I think some of them will be really fun, though at the moment they’re all pretty stereotypical. Nah, what keeps this one going for the moment is the plot, specifically the mystery of What’s Up with Kohinata?

• Title: Rosario to Vampire
• Studio: Gonzo
• Genre: Romantic Comedy/Harem

Ratings (out of 5):

• Story: ♥♥♥

• Animation: ♥♥½
• Characters: ♥♥♥
• OP/ED Themes: ♥♥½ (ED only)
• Overall: ♥♥♥ (Kind of like wanting to be taken to a fancy restaurant and going bowling instead– fun, but not as good as I hoped.)

Thoughts:
Hokay, so, Tsukune Aono completely failed to get into any of the high schools he wanted to and, as a result, was left behind by all of his classmates…until his dad managed to pick up some kind of freshman orientation packet dropped by a spooky priest which permitted Aono to attend the Youkai Academy. Tsukune hops on the bus to attend his new (apparently boarding) school, and on the way is smacked in the head by a girl riding a bicycle. (Why do girls on bikes always hit guys in anime? Is this some kind of Japanese equivalent to shooting spitwads at the girl you have a crush on in kindergarten? Or is it more like, “Smacking you upside the head with a bicycle: it’s like saying hello in Japan.)

The pink-haired girl introduces herself as a vampire named Moka and proceeds to drink a bit of Tsukune’s blood. In spite of this introduction, Tsukune is still shocked when, during his first class, he’s told that Youkai Academy is, in fact, a school for youkai– demons. Eventually, after a bit of emo whining and bawling by Moka and Tsukune, he informs her that he is in fact a human (and therefore supposed to be dead the moment he set foot on campus), and they learn that he can’t leave the campus for at least another month, when the next bus comes.

The good news for Tsukune is that the academy, which prepares youkai to live in a world of humans, requires all students to stay in their human forms and to not reveal their own identities to each other, so Tsukune may yet get away from this thing alive.

The plot is cute, but the art and animation aren’t as sharp as I was expecting. Also, the color scheme is a little funny sometimes, like in the picture above. The pacing felt a little off; it took about two minutes for Tsukune to explain why he’s headed to the Youkai Academy and felt rushed. Then the whole Moka/Tsukune relationship was established more or less instantaneously, and their later interactions were, shall we say, HIGHLY emotional. It felt a little overboard to me; I was hoping for a bit more comedy and a bit less emo.

There is also shit-tons of fanservice, from the first panty shot– a random nameless high school girl within the first 20 seconds, and for the rest of the episode there’s hardly a shot of Moka where her panties aren’t showing –but that’s to be expected. I guess you can think of it as kind of like InuYasha, if it were a harem romantic comedy set in modern times. And probably a LOT less long. But plenty of anthropomorphs around, if that’s your bag. And even if it’s not, it’s still a cute-looking series with nice character designs (albeit archetypal characters so far) and a plot that has some promise.

So for now? We continue.

Okay! As promised, here is the Winter 2008 cheat sheet. Hit the jump to see it in this entry (I did my best to make it readable); click here to see a printable version, and this time I decided to make my own Excel spreadsheet of the shows available to you guys. Here it be.

These files feature the titles, Japanese titles, start dates, primary air times, studios, genres, website URLs, and a very short summary for all 23 upcoming TV anime. Hope you find it handy. ♥

Oh, and if you want the full preview, here are parts one, two, and three at Jtor.

Read the rest of this entry »

FYI, my 2008 Winter season preview has been going up on Jtor– part one features ARIA the Origination through Minamike ~okawari~, and part two is Mnemosyne through Rosario to Vampire. Part three will go up tomorrow and features the rest, which are Shigofumi through Zoku: Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei.

I’ll also post my season cheatsheet here tomorrow. :)