New Anime Series – Page 28

Nobunagun

(13 episodes)

What’s it about ?

Adaptation of an action manga series that defies any kind of one-line summary.

Characters

Shio, our protagonist, is a quirky high-school girl with hints of chuunibyou. At the very least, she’s a military nerd, and has no friends whatsoever. Also, she gets weird dreams where she’s Oda Nobunaga (as a middle-aged dude with a mustache), which she’s completely nonplussed about.

Kaoru is the one girl in her class that makes repeated attempts at befriending the weird loner during the class trip to Taiwan. (Why do I get the nagging feeling there’s more to her than can be taken at face value ?)

A giant monster invader from space, who suddenly interrupts all this riveting high school drama by landing close by and killing tons of people.

“Jack the Ripper”, or at least one of his distant descendants who’s part of Earth’s first response team, and somehow can channel the bloodline of his ancestor to summon a super-weapon. Unfortunately, he’s underestimated the Invader (what do you mean there were hundreds of smaller ones inside ?), and his backup are still on their way. Oops.

Fortunately, it turns out that Shio is a descendant of Nobunaga, and can use Jack’s macguffin to summon her own weapon : the Nobuna-Gun. Witness her glee as she coins that so-terrible-it’s-awesome pun ! She’s going to enjoy this.

Production Values

Very fun to look at ; the first half has scores of random annotations that quickly set the scene and are funny on their own right, and the second half makes some great use of colour to enhance the atmosphere and underline the action.

Overall Impression

Well, this is definitely a series that knows how to build up its rampant insanity. It knows what it’s doing, and how to make it as impactful as possible.

… On the other hand, I have a hard time caring ; I can’t connect with anyone but Shio, and even then that’s not enough for me to stick with the series. I’m sorry, it’s not you, it’s me.

via [In which I review] New anime, Winter 2014 – Page 3.

My Neighbour Seki (Tonari no Seki-kun)

(12ish 8-minute episodes ?)

What’s it about ?

Adaptation of a gag manga.

Characters

Seki is a high-school boy who does anything but pay attention in class ; this episode, he builds an impressive chain of dominoes with dozens of erasers, and other various stationery.

Yokoi, our point-of-view character, sits right next to him ; she’s both bemused and fascinated by her neighbour’s antics. And of course it’s always her who gets chastised for not paying attention.

Production Values

Not very good, but it’s well-directed enough to sell the jokes.

Overall Impression

From what I understand, the manga features endless variations of the same basic joke. But it’s a good joke, and 8 minutes is the right duration to give each iteration the room to breathe, without outliving its welcome.

It made me laugh, and I’m up for more of the same.

via [In which I review] New anime, Winter 2014 – Page 3.

Nobunaga the Fool

(13 episodes)

What’s it about ?

Arghlsidfssqe.

Wait, let me try this again. This is a bizarre multimedia project ; the other media being stage plays. (With animated sequences.)
The setting involves two twin planets ; the “East world” is vaguely modelled on the Warring Kingdoms, while the “West world” features random European historical figures from centuries apart.

Also, mecha. And tarot.

Characters

Nobunaga “the Fool” is obviously our protagonist. He’s the cocky teenage son of the Oda family who has adventures with his sidekicks Mitsuhide and Hideyoshi. He’s supposedly a cunning strategist, but so far his only display of that is “tell everyone to run like hell from the bigass army that’s vastly superior”, so yeah. Not that he’s taken seriously, given his reputation for mischief. Thus plenty of people die, and he vows to “change the world”.

Jeanne Kaguya d’Arc (/facepalm) is a teenage girl from the West world whose propensity to hear voices has labelled her a witch. The mysterious dreams she’s been having of being burned at the stake (in “Paris”, /double-facepalm) aren’t helping. Since those dreams also prominently feature Nobunaga, she vows to head for the East world.

Leonardo da Vinci agrees. Wait, were you stalking her to appear just right at this moment ? And what’s with the megaphone ? Anyway, he works for King Arthur, and together they board Magellan’s spaceship. From which they drop onto the East world, with a mecha in tow. And they crash-land right next to Nobunaga, who immediately hijacks the mecha to fight the incoming enemy armies.

Production Values

Perfectly alright. The character designs have the same clean genericness as most other Satelight productions, but they’re the least of the show’s problem.

Overall Impression

Where do I even start with this ? It’s pointless to deride the laughably inept use of historical figures, although they sure are distracting. I presume it’s supposed to be a fun romp, but the result is just a terrible mess that fails to bring its disparate elements into a coherent whole. It just feels completely creatively bankrupt, and desperate in its attempt to coopt everything into itself. That none of the characters are interesting (aside from maybe da Vinci, who’s just weird) doesn’t help.

No way I’m watching one more episode of this.

via [In which I review] New anime, Winter 2014 – Page 3.

Space Dandy

(26 episodes)

What’s it about ?

Shinichiro Watanabe (Cowboy Bebop, Samurai Champloo) makes his grand directing return (let’s all politely ignore Kids on the Slope) with a comedy S-F series he’s described as “26 episodes of Mushroom Samba”.

This isn’t false advertising.

Characters

Space Dandy, our protagonist, makes a living exploring the universe to catalogue exotic alien species. (From what I understand, he’s a freelancer working for some governmental office.) If these travels coincidentally happen to make him visit every single space restaurant of the aptly-name “Boobies” franchise, well that can’t be helped, can it ? If you haven’t twigged by now, he’s a lecherous lout, and not exactly the sharpest bulb in the mixed metaphor ; but he’s got the charisma to kinda get away with it. Well, just barely.

QT is his long-suffering robot assistant. The poor thing is so obsolete it has to read books to keep up to date. Still, by default it has the highest IQ in the spaceship, and so it’s stuck being the straight ~~man~~ robot to Space Dandy. And complaining about the crappy unhelpful narration.

“Meow” (real name unpronounceable) is a cat-alien that Space Dandy initially mistakes as a rare species. He’s not ; he’s a completely ordinary Betelgeusean. But he vaguely remembers a place with exotic aliens, so our heroes take him for a ride. After a trippy journey that involved accidentally unravelling the fabric of spacetime, it turns out that this is a very dangerous place indeed.

Dr Gel is an agent of the Gogol Empire (*snicker*) who’s tracking our hero because he’s the Key to the Universe or somesuch nonsense. Now, I hope he survives being summarily executed by his boss for losing track of his target (during the spacetime havoc previously mentioned), as the design for his ship is so amazing (the Statue of Liberty’s head in bondage !) that I want to see more of it.

Production Values

Very impressive indeed ; it’s bursting at the seams with creativity and style, and the wild action sequences have to be seen to be believed.

It helps that Yoko Kanno turns out one of her best scores in ages.

Overall Impression

Warning : this is a very dumb show that starts with Space Dandy monologuing about how butts are better than boobies. It sets the mood : every character in this is a moron, and haphazardly bumbles from mishap to disaster. You’ve been forewarned ; the stupid is deep in this one.

This being said, it’s every bit as good as you’d expect from its pedigree : there’s nothing wrong with plain dumb fun, and Watanabe is a master of the form who knows how to produce a damn entertaining show. He somehow manages the tour de force of making Space Dandy somewhat bearable as a character, despite all the boneheaded actions he does during the course of this episode. (QT and even Meow savagely mocking him helps.)

Everything it’s been hyped up to be, and then some. Definitely one of the best shows of the season already.

via [In which I review] New anime, Winter 2014 – Page 3.

Noragami

(12 episodes)

What’s it about ?

Urban fantasy action-comedy, adapted from a manga series.

Characters

Yato, our protagonist, is a god. Admittedly, not one of the big leagues : he’s a vagrant god with no dedicated shrine and barely any followers. But he’s ambitious, so he’s eager to answer the prayers of the rare people calling to him to try and build his fanbase. His “missions” include anything from purging the nefarious ghosts haunting various place, to finding a lost cat.

Tomone, his partner, is a magical blade who’s very efficient at dispatching ghosts. Unfortunately, she’s about had it with her master’s hobo lifestyle, and leaves him without even a month’s notice. How rude.

Hiyori used to be an ordinary high school girl before crossing Yato’s path… no, wait, scratch that, she was already a bit weird even before that. Still, her life completely changes when she’s hit by a truck while trying to push Yato out of the way (not that he even needed the help), and she’s now half-dead. Basically, her soul randomly leaves her body from time to time. Obviously she doesn’t enjoy the situation, but it’s not like Hato has any clue whether she can even be made “normal” again. Still, if she makes the token 5-yen offering, he’ll be happy to look into it…

Production Values

Pretty good, as you’d expect from Studio Bones. The ghosts are creepy as heck, and the action sequences are well-directed.

Overall Impression

This was perfectly okay. It’s got a decent premise, with some fun world-building, and some very good comedic timing. A lot depends on how much you can bear with Yato, who’s a bit of a cocky brat ; but Hiyori is a good foil for him, and they play well together.

I’m probably going to give it a couple more episodes to see where it goes ; but I’m not sure I’ll stick with it, as this is a busy season for me… Oh, wait, Taku Iwasaki is doing the score. Well, that settles it : I’m in.

via [In which I review] New anime, Winter 2014 – Page 3.

Recently, my sister is unusual. (ImoCho – Saikin, Imouto no Yousu ga Chotto Okashiinda ga.)

(12 episodes)

What’s it about ?

It’s a ~~light novel~~ manga adaptation with an absurdly long title with the word “imouto” in it : you know what to expect.

Actually, no, you don’t. Brace yourselves.

Characters

Yuuya, the male lead. His father has just remarried, and new!Mom comes with a stepsister in tow. Oh, and both parents bugger off to India the next day for work reasons, so the two new siblings will be left alone together in the house. Yuuya’s not thrilled about this, to put it mildly. But since he’s a boring generic guy, he mostly takes it in stride. Forget about him, he’s not really the protagonist anyway.

Mitsuki, said new stepsister, whose behaviour looks very erratic until you start seeing her perspective. No, she’s not randomly assaulting her brother and then immediately backing the hell off due to regret or whatever : those incestuous “episodes” actually happen whenever she’s possessed by a ghost fairy. No, seriously.

Hiyori, said fairy, is hugely attracted to Yuuya, whom she calls “big brother” for some unexplained reason. She comes in tow with a magical chastity belt which is now permanently affixed to Mitsuki, to her great displeasure. (And to her distress, as she wastes her “three-minute-open-per-hour” window just before having to go to the toilet. Cue five minutes of embarrassment “comedy” until the episode mercifully ends.)

There are various other side characters making appearances, presumably to be fleshed out later. You know a series commits to a theme when even the token teacher drones a lesson about the etymology of the world “imouto” and how it relates to incest.

Production Values

Considering how many shots focus on Mitsuki wearing the chastity belt, you won’t be surprised for there to be some heavy (if playful) censorship. Still, there’s no mistaking what happens in the scene where Hiyori sexually assaults Mitsuki (and masturbates while possessing her body), so this is definitely a NSFW softcore porn show.

Besides that, it doesn’t look half bad. I’m not sure what’s going on in the ED sequence, though, as it looks like a completely different show. (Hiyori fantasizing about Yuuya, maybe ?)

Overall Impression

Well, this is quite a rollercoaster. Whatever you may thing about it, this is certainly one of the most creative incest-bait show I’ve ever watched. Not only is the premise completely bonkers, but it tackles it headlong and runs with its lunacy. It’s never boring, I’ll grant it that.

I’m almost tempted to keep watching just for the trainwreck factor, but then I remember that I’m already watching too many shows, and there’s plenty actually promising stuff upcoming in the next few days.

via [In which I review] New anime, Winter 2014 – Page 2.

Witch Craft Works

(12 episodes)

What’s it about ?

You know those light novel adaptations about girls falling into a boring protagonist’s lap, with a generic fantasy setting ? Well, this isn’t one of the many ones we’re getting this season ; it’s actually adapted from a manga series. But it sure fooled me.

Characters

Takamiya, our generic high-school-student male lead. You can see this is adapted from a light novel because he’s constantly narrating or monologuing, when he should really just shut up and let the story happen. There’s certainly absolutely nothing of interest in his commentary. To the point that it’s a relief when a building drops onto him.

Kagari, the girl sitting next to him in class. She’s ridiculously popular, with a humongous fanclub stalking her, and bullying Takamiya when he gets a bit too close to her by accident. She also looks permanently zoned out, never letting any emotion show on her blank face. Also, he learns that she’s sticking close to him on purpose, so as to protect him from magical attacks. You see, he’s Important ; he’s to be her “Princess”. (Yes, you read that right. He has no clue what the heck either.) Also, she’s a Fire Witch, and quite a powerful one.

Kuraishi, the catgirl witch behind the attacks. She deals with illusion magic, so unfortunately a building didn’t really drop onto Takamiya. On the other hand, she can also command armies of armoured rabbit dolls, or whatever those hordes are. Kagari makes short work of those, but they do look quite threatening until then.

The attacker wasn’t actually a student in this school, but she transfers in at the end, together with four others who look just as antagonistic.

Production Values

Wow, there’s quite a bit of budget here ; the fights looks very good indeed. The visuals for the hordes of rabbits are a lot of fun (and there’s quite some attention to detail to give each some personality), and there are also nice visual gags for the bullying shots. The soundtrack is very good, too : the score is very atmospheric indeed.

Overall Impression

Hmm. I was planning to give this a pass, because seriously this story is the kind of generic crap we get several times over each season. But the directing is impressive enough to make me take notice ; it’s a great-looking and -sounding package.

Against my better judgement, I’m going to give it a second episode.

via [In which I review] New anime, Winter 2014.

Buddy Complex

What’s it about ?

Terminator with mecha.

Characters

Aoba, our generic high-school student protagonist. He’s got a generic (absence of) personality, and generic friends constantly saying how great a guy he is. He’s the picture of boring normalcy.

Hina, the girl sitting next to him in class who transferred in recently. Everyone just assumes she’s stalking him because she’s infatuated with him (for some unfathomable reason) ; and while there might be some degree of truth to that, the real reason is that he’s going to be Really Important in the future, and she’s a time-traveller who’s come back in time to protect him from…

Er, actually, I didn’t quite catch this guy’s name. (And since the credits just have him as a purposefully uncredited “pilot”, I presume that’s a plot point.) Anyway, he’s fallen into a wormhole from the future with his mecha, and for some reason he makes a beeline to kill Aoba. Hina was in hot pursuit, but somehow ended up arriving several months earlier ; this makes me believe time-travel isn’t an exact science here.

Anyway, the battle escalates enough for Hina to decide that the best course of action is to throw her mecha (with Aoba also in the cockpit) together with the other guy’s into another wormhole. When Aoba wakes up after that, he’s alone in a completely different mecha, at some point in the future, and the army owning that mecha is scrambling for combat…

Production Values

It’s Sunrise doing mecha. Of course it looks fine.

Overall Impression

Well, that’s certainly an intriguing start. I’m not too fond of the characters yet, but the premise is introduced well enough to feel interesting despite them. I certainly appreciated the way it rushed to have Aoba into the future so quickly, as there certainly wasn’t anything of much interest in the present.

I’ll give it a few episodes to see where it goes. (I have no clue whatsoever why it’s called “Buddy Complex” yet, for example.)

via [In which I review] New anime, Winter 2014.

Fall 2013 capsules

Miss Monochrome has a bizarre genesis. This is a virtual idol character, a bit like Hatsune Miku… except she’s voiced by proper idol/VA Yui Horie (with some mighty autotune, if the end song is any indication). Anyway, this is a series of 4-minute shorts starring the character, trying to become an idol.
The good news is that, after a bit of a dull start, it manages to place some good deadpan jokes. It’s genuinely funny, which is more than I expected of such a gimmick show.

On the other hand, I can’t make head nor tails out of Super Seishyun Brothers, another series of 4-minute shorts starring (unlike the title suggests) two brother-sister pairs. It actually started airing a couple of weeks ago, but I was (unsuccessfully) waiting for a second episode to get translated to get a better feel of it.
So far, it’s a gag show that barely raises a smile at all. It utterly failed to make it clear whether there’s any premise beyond “here are four character with outlandish (but generic) personalities.” I’m giving it a second episode just in case, but it looks completely skippable.

via [In Which I Review] New anime, Fall 2013 – Page 4.

Hey, there are still more new shows getting released !

Admittedly, that means the like of Gaist Crusher : a kids’ sentai show adapted from some collectible card game. It’s the blandest and most generic piece of crap I have watched for a long time, which is saying something. From off-the-shelf one-dimensional characters to nearly absent world-building (what are the heroes even fighting ?) to character designs that would have been rejected by any self-respecting Saint Seiya clone… There’s absolutely nothing to recommend in this, and no way I’m bothering with a full review for it.

(That I watched this with terrible subtitles that seem to have gone through several languages before reaching English probably didn’t help. But even a decent translation can’t save this show.)

via [In Which I Review] New anime, Fall 2013 – Page 14.

Galilei Donna

(11 episodes)

What’s it about ?

“21th-century steampunk” is the best description I can come up with, however nonsensical it sounds.

Characters

Our central characters are the three “Galilei” sisters, apparently direct descendants of the historical figure :
– Hazuki wants to become a top-class lawyer, but is clearly dropping out of her law college.
– Kazuki is a high schooler whose main interest seems to be martial arts, and who hates interacting with her classmates.
– I’m not sure Hozuki even goes to school ; she spends most of her time tinkering in the basement. I love her jet-powered foldable scooter, which can somehow be transformed into a portable rocket launcher.

Mom spends a lot of time blathering on and on about the great legacy they’re carrying, and failing to measure up to (not that any of them care) ; Dad is a lot more easygoing. You can see why they’re separated.

Cicinho is a stylish and charismatic Italian villain who’s after the Galilei inheritance (whatever that is ; Mom and Dad claim to have no clue) and kicks off the plot by having his MIB try and capture the three kids. After the first “subtle” attempt fails (Hazuki’s saved by a college friend of hers ; Kazuki martial-arts her way out ; and Hozuki has a portable rocket launcher) and the ‘rents call on the police to get some protection, he barges in with a lot more men and firepower, and captures them all.

Wait, not all. Hozuki manages to sneak into the basement, from which she launches a giant goldfish-shaped flying ship. Sure, Cicinho has a bigger flying ship, but the goldfish’s got better weapons and AI.

The rest of the family have no clue what the heck. Neither does Cicinho, who exits stage left.

And it turns out that Hazuki’s college friend/rescuer possesses an agenda of her own. Of course she does.

Production Values

Very impressive. Lots of CG for all the flying vehicles, but it’s integrated into the main animation rather smoothly.

Overall Impression

Well, this is certainly a show that knows how to make an impression. But for all the storm and thunder, it’s obviously going to be a story about a broken family reconnecting in face of adversity. While flying around the world in a giant mechanical goldfish.

I can get behind that.

via [In Which I Review] New anime, Fall 2013 – Page 13.