Month: January 2016

BBK/BRNK (Bubuki Buranki)

(12ish episodes ?)

What’s it about ?

Hmm… An youth adventure series featuring some mecha action. Also, a rare show not adapting anything.

Characters

As a kid, Azuma used to live with his parents and twin sister in a small house in the countryside… with tons of mechas (the “Buranki”) lying around, sleeping ominously. Sometimes one of them wakes up ; it’s quickly made clear that Mom is some sort of semi-retired superheroine who subdues them and keeps them under control.

While Azuma was a rather quiet and fearful kid, his sister Kaoruko was a bonehead tomboy who kept endangering the both of them. She got it into her head that the Buranki needed to be dealt with definitely, and that by aggressively kickstarting her own powers she could kill them all. This was of course a massively stupid idea, as she wakes them all up at once. The best Mom can do at damage control is to stay behind while she sends off Hubbie and the kids while she stays behind to try and contain the Buranki. And by “off”, I mean off the huge space rock the whole sequence has been taking place in, and down to Earth. The impact may have cause some collateral damage.

Cue to 10 years later. Dad and Kaoruko are nowhere to be seen. Mom is the official scapegoat for everything wrong ever, to the point that it’s obvious that there’s a lot of cover-up going on. Azuma had been roaming the world looking for something, and gets arrested nearly as soon as he puts a foot back in Japan.

Fortunately, he has a bunch of friends (he has not seen in a while) who come to his rescue from the fascist cops. They all have Bubiki, aka “hands of Buranki”, aka weird super-weapons with eyes. The issue being that the most elite of their pursuers have better ones.

Production Values

Bless studio Sanzigen (Black Rock Shooter, Arpeggio of Blue Steel…) for keeping trying to make cel-shaded CG animation work on a TV budget. 1/4th of the time here, it doesn’t quite work : the body language and the facial animation are a bit awkward. But the rest of the time, it really shines : the action sequences are marvelously kinetic, the scenery has an impressive sense of scale, and the nice colourful designs for characters and weapons really pop. The epic score helps quite a bit, too.

Overall Impression

Wow. This is almost very good, but just shy of it. Not because of the actual plot, which isn’t particularly distinctive ; it’s all in the energy of the storytelling, and the quality of execution. Which makes it all the worse when there are blips into the uncanny valley. And that’s a shame, as it’s otherwise quite enthralling (and enough to make be ignore my qualms about the minor plot holes).

I’ll be watching a few more episodes, hoping it can keep up its frantic pace for the long run. We’ll see.

Source: [In Which I Review] New anime, Winter 2016 – Page 3

DAGASHIKASHI

(12 episodes)

What’s it about ?

Adaptation of a romantic comedy (with a strong emphasis on “comedy”) manga series about the heir to a sweets shop.

The title is a pun, by the way ; “Dagashi” are traditional (cheap) Japanese sweets, but it can also be read as “but still…”.

Characters

Kokonotsu, our male lead, is the heir to a rural sweets shop, but to his father’s despair, he’d rather draw manga instead. Until one day, comes a girl who looks just like one of his drawings…

Hotaru is from that one famous sweets-making dynasty. She’s here to headhunt Kokonotsu’s father, as the company would really enjoy his expertise. While he appreciates the offer, he does need his son to agree to take over the shop when he’s gone. So she takes for her new mission to convince Kokonotsu. A good chunk of the humour comes from the contrast between her headstrong personality and her sheltered upbringing, as this is her first trip to the countryside.

Saya is the barrista at the local coffee shop, and obviously crushing for Kokonotsu. But she’s too tsundere to say it outright, and he hasn’t picked up the hint. Of course, she takes very badly to Hotaru hovering around him.

Production Values

Decent enough. What makes the show visually distinctive are its character designs, and they mostly work in context.

Overall Impression

This is a perfectly okay romantic comedy. There are some good gags, some bits of awkward pacing at the story skips from a scene to another, and the characters have good chemistry together.

In any other season I’d be gladly enjoying the show. With such a busy schedule and heavy competition ? It may fall into the cracks.

Source: [In Which I Review] New anime, Winter 2016 – Page 3

Pandora in the Crimson Shell: Ghost Urn (Koukaku no Pandora)

(12ish episodes ?)

What’s it about ?

Adaptation of a manga from Masamune Shirow, of Ghost in the Shell fame. Except at the stage of his career where he can indulge into drawing what he’s always wanted to : lesbian quasi-porn. This time around, where the ladies have very petite bodies indeed.

Characters

Nene, our protagonist, is a rather naive cyborg who had so much of her body replaced that she’s often mistaken for an android. She was on a cruise to wherever, playing videogames, when she caught the attention of…

Uzal, a mad scientist who claims to be fighting whatever is causing those random highly pyrotechnic attacks all around, and “helps” our heroine get to the safety of her lab. It’s very obvious well before we get onscreen confirmation that she’s gaslighting Nene so that she can become a powerful tool and weapon against her enemies.

Clarion, an android, is Uzal’s main underling ; one of the chief reasons Nene goes along is that she finds her cute. Also, a way for Nene to power up (installing new apps that are totally not malware) is for her to put her hand in a cavity in Clarion’s crotch and… DAMN YOU SHIROW.

Uzal also has a squad of incompetent underlings in fetishistic outfits (bunny girl, maid, etc.), because of course she does.

Production Values

It’s colourful, the action sequences are well-executed without overstaying their welcome, and beyond the obvious there’s way less fanservice than you’d expect.

Overall Impression

There are bits here I quite like. Uzal as a Totally Not Evil mad scientist has heaps of charisma. The running gag with the reporter who always gets hit by collateral damage is mildly funny. And it’s certainly not boring.

But then you get to the actual premise, and NOPE NOPE NOPE. It doesn’t help that every character is so one-dimensional I really don’t care what happens to them, or where this is going. The season is way too busy for me to bother hate-watching this.

Source: [In Which I Review] New anime, Winter 2016 – Page 3

Phantasy Star Online 2 The Animation

(12 episodes)

What’s it about ?

Adaptation of the MMORPG of the same name. Well, kinda.

Characters

Usually videogame adaptations are set in the game’s universe, and follow its plot. Not so here : this is set in a futuristic highschool where PSO2 is the latest big fad.

Itsuki, our protagonist, has never played the game before. He’s been too busy with his studies, helping out various clubs, and being generically nice to pay attention to the game everyone else is playing. That’s until he’s summoned by…

Rina, the student council president. She “offers” him the place of vice-president after it’s gone unexpectedly vacant during the holidays. He’s all the more bemused when she tells him the whole job is to play PSO2 and report on it. WTF ? Oh, well, sounds easy enough…

Cue every little detail of Itsuki learning to play the game. This includes a huge dude in armour heavy-handedly offering the nOOb some help for his first quest. (It’s obviously Rina “in disguise”.)

There’s another PC/girl watching over the whole thing who’s obviously going to be introduced properly next episode.

Production Values

Nice enough, I guess ? I certainly would have liked to study in this futuristic school, given the facilities. (Well, minus the weird paranoid rent-a-cop at the entrance. THAT was just weird as a thing to spend so much time on.)

It does manage to make PSO2 look somewhat cool (if hopelessly generic), so there’s that.

Overall Impression

Well, that’s certainly a weird adaptation choice. Have the writers given up on imposing structure to a sprawling MMORPG universe, and instead falling back onto well-worn highschool tropes ? This has the unfortunate effect of most of the screentime being devoted to characters telling us that PSO2 is a cool game, instead of actually showing it. Especially as it looks like any other MMORPG, and the narrative destroys any attempt at showcasing its worldbuilding.

As an advert, it feels like a failure. As an actual show… Well, the characters have little depth, the weirdness of the PSO2 craze being the student council’s main focus isn’t particularly compelling, and it’s kinda dull overall. I’ll pass.

Source: [In Which I Review] New anime, Winter 2016 – Page 3

Girls Beyond the Wasteland (Shoujo-tachi wa Kouya wo Mezasu)

(12 episodes)

What’s it about ?

Adaptation of a visual novel about highschool students producing a visual novel.

Characters

Buntarou, our male lead, is your usual “helps out everyone” aimless high-school student, but at least he’s got good banter with his friends. Since this is a VN adaptation, it takes the slow approach of making us spend a lot of time with him just going about his day before the plot finally gets introduced. We do learn that he has some decent writing talent, but moreover he’s good at taking charges during crisis and making everyone work together while assuaging egos. All skills that should be invaluable later on.

His close friends include Yuuka, his tomboy childhood friend with a talent for acting, and Atomu, the third wheel who’s doomed to fade into the background.

Kuroda is a weird girl who keeps checking him out. After a tense not-date, she eventually reveals she’s been scouting him for her VN-making circle. She’s very driven about it, viewing it as her future career rather than just something to keep busy during high school. That, er, may be a bit over-optimistic, but hey, this is a wish-fulfilment fantasy.

Production Values

Perfectly okay.

Overall Impression

It’s your average “school club” series, basically. Its origin means that it’s more interested in setting up the long game than rushing through particularly noteworthy sequences ; as a result, it lacks some punch to really catch the audience’s attention.

I’m willing to give it a second episode to see whether it picks up a bit, but as a Thursday show it’s facing fierce competition for my time.

Source: [In Which I Review] New anime, Winter 2016 – Page 3

Shouwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjuu

(13 episodes, at least the first one of which is 46-minute-long)

What’s it about ?

Adaptation of an award-winning josei manga set in the late Showa era (the 1970s) about rakugo performers. In case you’re not aware, rakugo is an old and codified form of Japanese theater that involves a lone actor sitting down and acting out all the characters of his chosen routine.

Characters

“Yotaro” (a nickname for a good-for-nothing in rakugo slang) used to be a lowlife and is just now getting out of jail, with nowhere to go. But he’s vowed to go straight, as he’s been touched and inspired by a rakugo act performed during his time in prison. Rakugo is now going to be he way of life, and thus to learn the trade he throws himself before…

Master Yakumo, the unrivalled 18th master of the art. He’s famous and respected enough to have thousand-place venues sell out, and his records are regularly played over the radio. At first he seems like a haughty jerk who only takes on Yotaro as an apprentice as a joke (never bothering to teach him anything), but there’s clearly more to him than that. He certainly can’t have been performing in prisons for the money. Also, he’s acutely aware that he’s not getting any younger, and the artform may die out with him. And then there’s the whole case of…

Konatsu, his ward, and the daughter of his former rival, who died in a mysterious “accident”. While the then young girl jumped to conclusions after seeing a bloodied Yakumo cradling the corpse of her father, there can be more charitable readings of that brief flashbacks. Especially as he took the young orphan in and lets a lot of her provocations go. It’s never explicitly stated, but the obvious reason why he never took an apprentice until now is because he wants HER (despite women rakugo performers not being a thing in this age), but she’s too proud to ask. Heck, taking in Yotaro can be seen as another provocation in that direction, as he won’t explicitly ask her either.

The elephant in the room is obviously Konatsu’s father. A big point here is that he had a completely different style from Yakumo’s, joyful and hilarious when the current master is colder in its precision and awesomeness. Konatsu has trained in that style in secret, and Yotaro is picking up on it thanks to her being the only one willing to help his training so far. (It may also be better suited to his natural talent, however much he admires Yakumo’s style.)

The next episode preview promises a flashback to Konatsu’s father & Yakumo training under the former master, which should both be instructive, entertaining (since it’s Yakumo narrating), and clear the air so that everyone’s character arc can progress further.

Production Values

Studio Deen has become a bit of a running joke over the last decade, with terrible adaptations marred by poor quality control. The good news is that not only do they have some proper budget for this project, but they’re also using their one good director they poached off SHAFT to do Sankarea. Now, unlike his previous show there’s nearly nothing SHAFT-like here ; it just wouldn’t fit the material.

Rakugo is a very stylised artform ; the performer can’t move too much, and is limited to a few standard props for sound effects. The whole piece must be conveyed through body language, facial expression, and masterful voice-acting as they keep switching between characters. This show manages to reproduce all of this perfectly through exactly the same means. Also, it would be all to easy to depict all the character switches through jump cuts, Smeagol/Gollum style ; that device is used with restraint, and only after the animation has taken the time to actually depict the performers switching characters.

It should also be mentioned that we’ve got veteran voice-actors at the top of their art. Akira Ishida turns one of his best performances in ages Giving the appropriate maturity and gravitas to Yakumo. Tomokazu Seki is well within his usual niche as Yotaro, but performs splendidly. And I just can’t wait to hear Yuu Kobayashi perform some actual rakugo, as she’s one of the finest comedy voice-actresses of her generation.

Overall Impression

I expected this to be very good, as a premise so off the beaten path (adult characters, in the 1970s, and all about the beauty and joy of acting) doesn’t get adapted to anime without strong source material and a will to convey it properly. I didn’t expect it to be THIS good and enthralling, to the point that it took me a while to notice how long the first episode was.

By the way, this length was the right choice to start off the adaptation. Not only does it carry the story towards a stronger catharsis, but it also gives ample room to have the characters actually perform rakugo, and show off how awesome a spectacle it can be. Yotaro gets to perform a full “Burglar Goes Straight” routine, and it’s never boring. Ditto for Yakumo’s “Vengeful Woman” skit. (And if the choice of those pieces feels a bit on-the-nose… Well, that’s obviously on purpose from the characters themselves, who put a lot of themselves into their performances and often have a point to make. Ditto for Yakumo’s offscreen performance of a “scare ’em straight” piece in prison, of course.)

This is one of the strongest starts for a show this season, with a depth, a heart and sheer quality of execution that’s to a whole other level compared to nearly everything else. I want to see more of these fascinating, pluridimensional characters and their struggle against the impeding death of their chosen artform, so I will definitely watch this to the end.

Source: [In Which I Review] New anime, Winter 2016 – Page 2

Ultra Super Anime Time Block (Winter 2016)

Ultra Super Anime Time Block is an interesting timeslot broadcast by TokyoMX for the last few seasons. Basically, rather than a normal 24-minute-long anime series, it’s a collection of three completely unrelated shorts, each 8-minute-long. I’m all for this kind of thing, as there’s room for shows that can’t sustain a whole 24-minute episode, without falling into the other extreme of 2/3-minute episodes that end up being rather unsatisfying (but are very common because that’s easy to fit somewhere into the schedule). Of course, that depends on the actual shows proposed being any good. So how’s this season’s selection ?

 

Please Tell Me! Galko-chan adapts a gag web-manga where the gimmick is that the narrator goes out of her way to ask (rather crude) questions to the cast. The joke is that while main character Galko looks the part of the classic truant “gal” girl, she’s actually mostly normal and there are mundane explanations for her gal-like outbursts. Oh, and everyone has puns for their names. (Otako is the otaku-like girl, and so on.) As a whole, it’s mildly funny, if a bit overreliant on gross hygiene gags. There are worse ways to spend 8 minutes.

 

Sculpture Boys (Sekkou Boys) is an original concept about a bunch of male idols… Well, the first episode is mostly focused on their new manager, just fresh out of art college. With not much artistic talent, and completely burned out of painting sculpture after sculpture after sculpture, she moved on to a field where she would only deal with actual people. Or so she thinks, as her new charges are… a quatuor of classical busts. Talking (and presumably singing) busts. (After all, as the agency’s president says, there’s no danger of them sleeping around, so that’s one less headache to deal with compared to “normal” idols.)

The premise is patently absurd, but the show manage to sell it by ignoring the actual title characters for most of the episode, and instead building to the manager’s inevitable freakout. Even if you’re aware of what the series is about beforehand, the joke is so well-paced that it still works. I’m not sure there’s 12 (even short) episodes of material here, but I’m willing to give it a try.

 

Tabi Machi Late Show is about professional cooking or something ? It’s deathly dull and barely animated at all. The only good news is that it’s only 4 episodes, so its slot will be taken over by something different in February (a new iteration of the Kono Danshi franchise) and March (a remake/extension of Makoto Shinkai’s 1999 short She & Her Cat, of all things ?).

Source: [In Which I Review] New anime, Winter 2016 – Page 2

Norn9: Norn+Nonet

(12ish episodes)

What’s it about ?

Adaptation of a sci-fi “otome” visual novel. Interestingly, according to the Wikipedia description it seems to have switched point-of-view characters from the very young dude (who’s yet to show up) to one of the girls (which feels much more conventional).

Characters

Koharu is a girl who’s forgotten nearly everything about herself (it takes the whole episode for her to remember her name), who one day feels to compel to head for a shuttle that leads her to THE WORLD. Not the stand, but a huge ship (big enough to host a town and some bits of lands inside) that travels across the globe… and maybe spacetime, if the appearance of Koharu’s hometown is any indication (The World looks much more futuristic).

The only crew (and inhabitants) of The World are about a dozen teenagers, who seem to have been recruited similarly. (The big difference is that Koharu somehow got her hands on an uniform before she even got inside.) They spend most of their time on the chores required to living on The World (fishing, growing crops, etc.), and frankly I have no clue how they do this with so few people given the sheer size of the thing. On the other hand, The World appears to be self-driving, randomly relocating itself to whatever crisis they are meant to solve. (The show remains mysterious as to what those are yet.)

Oh, and a tower explodes at the end. Good way to keep my interest up, show !

(It’s apparently called “Norn9” because there are 9 dudes aboard, and somehow the three girls – including Koharu – don’t count. Whatever)

Production Values

Quite sharp-looking ; it’s certainly very good at selling The World as a setting with a huge scale and on a completely different technological level from anything else.

As you’d expect for the source, there’s a decent amount of manservice, mainly in the form of a bunch of the guys spending noticeably more time than narratively necessary swimming around.

Overall Impression

Usually I’m not in the audience for otome adaptations, but I have to give points to this one for sheer ambition. Sure, it spends most of its time faffing around with nothing particularly interesting happening, and the main characters don’t deviate much from the usual archetypes, but it almost feels like there’s an actual plot and purpose to the show.

I’m probably going to be disappointed, but I’m giving this a second episode.

Source: [In Which I Review] New anime, Winter 2016 – Page 2

ERASED – The Town Where Only I am Missing (Boku dake ga Inai Machi)

(12 episodes, noitaminA)

What’s it about ?

Adaptation of a manga mystery series with a supernatural twist.

Interestingly, while the manga is still ongoing publication, the anime’s staff have made it clear they’re including its planned ending into their adaptation.

Characters

Satoru, our protagonist, is failed manga author in his late 20s who’s making do as a pizza delivery driver. At first he sounds like a highly cynical failure who doesn’t give a crap anymore, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. See, he’s somehow got the bizarre superpower to rewind time a bit after getting a flash that something terrible is about to happen. Nothing specific, but he’ll try his darndest to pay attention to his surroundings and notice anything going awry. Such as this truck driver having a heart attack and rushing towards an unsuspecting kid. Going out of his way to prevent that lands him into the hospital for a bit, but the guy is truly a hero. Dropping everything to act upon those not-quite-precognitive flashes… It quickly becomes obvious that an incident two decades ago where a girl was kidnapped and killed and maybe he could have prevented it by accompanying her home is still eating at him and informing his current behaviour (both the introverted cynicism and the hero complex).

Sachiko, his mother, comes to visit from Hokkaido after he gets released. While he doesn’t quite welcome her imposing on him without notice, she’s clearly worried about him. She’s now paying attention to his flashes… wait, did a dude just try kidnapping that girl in the supermarket parking lot, and only stopped when he saw her looking at him and taking a picture of his van’s plate ? Doesn’t this look a LOT like the kidnapping case two decades ago ? Maybe the slightly creepy older guy that always hung out with her son and got arrested wasn’t the true culprit… Okay, until now she may have tried to make Satoru forget about this, but it’s time she came clean with him about it and they figure this out together.

Ahahah, nope. Everything goes FUBAR that night. But when Satoru wakes up, he’s back in Hokkaido, two decades younger…

(Another prominent character this episode is Airi, a teenage coworker of Satoru’s who starts paying attention to him after witnessing his heroics. He isn’t amused by his mom’s attempts to set them up together, because seriously she’s at least ten years younger and still in high school. I have no clue how she’ll keep appearing in this show given we’ve now shifted to a time before she is even born…)

Production Values

Very good. Great attention to the body language, impressive staging for the “Rewind” set pieces… Even Sachiko looking weirdly young for a woman in her 50s is actually called out. Also, it features a great atmospheric score by Yuki Kajiura, without getting overpowered by it.

Overall Impression

Well, that’s our obvious candidate for Anime of the Season, right there. Perfectly paced, great characters, a cool gimmick, an intriguing mystery and driving question (“Can Satoru prevent those original kidnappings ? What happens if he does ?”)… This is just an enthralling start.

There’s tons of promise here, and a good chance it’ll actually deliver on a proper ending. Go for it.

Source: [In Which I Review] New anime, Winter 2016 – Page 2

Active Raid : Special Public Security Fifth Division Third Mobile Assault Eighth Unit (Kidou Kyoushuushitsu Dai Hakkei)

(12 episodes, with a second season already scheduled for Summer)

What’s it about ?

The director of Code Geass does Patlabor, basically. I.e. we’re following a dysfunctional police unit dealing with mecha-related crimes.

Characters

Asami is a teenage genius fresh off the academy (and some abroad internship) who’s tasked with “inspecting” the 8th unit. The unspoken assumption is that she’s supposed dig up enough evidence to shut down this embarassment of a squadron ; she sees it more as a personal challenge, and aims to straighten them all up by herself.

Now, at first the 8th does look like a collection of screw-ups :
– The neat freak who despises his co-workers
– The operator who’s too shy to communicate with her other than with text messages
– The petite and genial woman who turns out to be the chief, but certainly doesn’t act so
– The technician on loan from the partner mecha companies who’s way too creepy and touchy
– And of course the asshole who pickpocketed her phone on the train, and arrived late to the operation (with a bemused unrelated perp in tow)

The case of the week involves two teenagers holding up a bank with a pair of mechas (and dumb enough to tweet about it), as well as the ensuing protracted chase scene… Wait, this is way too well-planned a heist to be that simple (a drone airplane passing by just at the right time so that they can hitch a ride ?). The two mysterious people talking in riddles early on are probably involved in this.

The big idea here is that while the 8th at first look like a complete mess operating like cowboys, there’s a method to their madness, and they turn out to be surprisingly efficient as an unit considering how much they squabble. When Asami tries to school them on proper procedure, not only do they already know all this crap, but they also know how to navigate through all the cracks in the red tape and avoid the worst of political landmines. Frankly, given the insane constraints they’re under (can’t do any collateral damage / controlled blackouts HERE because a random building belongs to a prominent politician, and so on…), it’s a wonder how they can operate at all, let alone keep track of their quarries and successfully neutralize and arrest them.

Production Values

The character designs leave a bit to be desired, and that sure is a lot of stock footage for the “suit-up” scenes, but the important thing here is that the directors know how to pull off an extended chase scene with lots of twists without losing sight of clarity nor characterization. Being reunited with the Code Geass composer, who can jazz up an action sequence like nobody else, certainly helps.

Interestingly, the main bit of fanservice here is the two male leads being in speedoes for half the “suitup” sequences.

Overall Impression

Uh oh. There’s a lot to like in the concept and many of the details, but the execution doesn’t quite pull it off. It feels a bit too rushed and busy, trying to cram too much exposition and too many characters in at the same time. It’s also not helped by a very unlikeable point-of-view character ; it’s a wonder such an entitled little snot as Asami manages to be even halfway sympathetic at all. Not that the rest of the cast are much better.

And still… I could see this working, if it were to slow the heck down and leave more room for the characters to breathe. I really want to like it, and thus am willing to give it some rope, but it’s not quite there yet.

Source: [In Which I Review] New anime, Winter 2016 – Page 2