Tag: heroic-fantasy

Battle Girls – Time Paradox (Sengoku Otome: Momoiro Paradox)

(13ish episodes)

What’s it about ?

An ordinary high school girl is transported to a female version of feudal Japan.

Characters

Hideyoshi, our protagonist. Late for school, not very bright and utterly superficial. She goes to pray at a local shrine not to mess up with her exams, stumbles on a magic ritual, and that’s how she ends up in feudal Japan. Of course, her first reaction is to mistake everyone for cosplayers and complain about the poor cellphone reception.

Nobunaga Oda, at this stage a local feudal lord in a quest to gather the pieces of a mystical set of armor and conquer Japan. I have no clue why she tolerates Hideyoshi’s antics or has any reason to think she’ll be useful, besides plot convenience. (I mean, Hideyoshi’s Japan History textbook will probably come handy, but it’s introduced too late for that to work as an explanation for Oda’s tolerance.)

Mutsuhide, Oda’s aide, who for some reason looks exactly like one of Hideyoshi’s classmates (are they going for the “it was all a dream” ending ?). Utterly irritated by Hideyoshi, but suffers through it because Oda said so. I can sympathize.

The OP & ED show half a dozen more girls that shall presumably be introduced in later episodes.

Production Values

Well, it could be worse : sure, the outfits (especially Oda’s) are ridiculously stripperific, but we don’t get too many panty shots and the like. Still, to make clear what kind of series we’re watching, the ED shows all the girls naked, with thin strips of fabric overlaid at random to hide the naughty bits.

Overall Impression

It seems like nearly every season there’s one of these (See also : Hyakka Ryouran: Samurai Girls, Koihime†Musou…). It’s not outright terrible, but it’s very generic indeed and offers nothing of note to make it worth watching.

via [In which I review] New anime, Spring 2011 – Page 4.

Without Wings -under the innocent sky- (Ore-tachi ni Tsubasa wa Nai)

(12 episodes)

What’s it about ?

Fuck if I know ; I can’t make head nor tails of the plot. I’ll say “fanservice-heavy harem comedy with a dash of heroic fantasy” to err on the safe side, but even that fails to accurately describe it.

Characters

Takashi Haneda is the protagonist of a ridiculously cliché harem, with various girls (his little sister cousin, the aggressive one, the athletic one who lets her mind wander, and a fourth one I can’t quite get a hold of yet) fighting over him before he’s even stepped five feet towards school. Also, we get numerous panty shots and even naked shots of their breasts when they push themselves onto him. And he’s got whiny narration by Hiro Shimono (when did his career devolve into “cliché harem lead” ?). But the lot of them only get 5 minutes of screentime.

The rest of the episode is dedicated to a trio of loser dudes unlucky in love, and desperately trying to set up a drinking party with whatever girls they find. One of them is 35 and owns the bar they hang around at ; the other two look high-school/college-aged. Anyway, the only girls who accept the invite are the part-time waitresses. Overall, it’s a very pathetic scene that makes me loathe everyone involved.

But wait ! Just before and during the ending credits, we see all of them in a heroic-fantasy setting, fighting monsters and the like ! Is this a MMORPG or an actual parallel world they’re escaping into ? I have no clue ! (And why would Haneda need escaping anyway ?)

There’s also a bizarre framing device with radio/TV shows (including an outrageous American-accented DJ) shown in a rapid succession… and I’ve got no clue why they’re doing this.

Production Values

Decent, I suppose. The very heavy fanservice whenever a girl’s on screen is quite annoying, though.

Overall Impression

What the heck is this shit ?

Now, I can understand trying to be a bit creative when adapting yet another harem dating sim. But this is just incoherent crap, with three different narratives that completely fail to coalesce into any coherent whole. It’s probably trying for the “self-parody” angle, but that just makes it more obnoxious.

I hate every single character and it makes no sense whatsoever : avoid like the plague.

via [In which I review] New anime, Spring 2011 – Page 4.

Star Ocean EX

(26 episodes)

What’s it about ?

While investigating bizarre occurrences in a remote star system, a spaceship crashlands on a planet after encountering an unexpected asteroid field. While exploring, a member of the crew finds a portal that transports him to a fantasy world, where a local hails him as the Hero of Legend…

Characters

Claude, our protagonist. Son of a hero admiral who saved the galaxy 20 years before. Daddy takes him along on his trips, but does not take him seriously (and given how the brat has yet to display any shred of competence, I kinda agree). Anyway, our “hero” is prone to fits of whiny narration that do absolutely nothing to endear him to me.

Daddy The Admiral himself seems to be a decent sort (and he’s certainly good at saving his ship from random asteroids), and respected by his crew (which seems to consist of only five people, himself and his son included). However, despite him investigating a somewhat interesting plot (did someone send a death-moon to hit a planet ?), it looks like the series will focus on his annoying son’s trip to a fantasy world instead.

Rena, a female elf living in the fantasy world. Mistakes Claude for the Hero of Destiny as she sees him defeat a monster with his raygun (which looks like a sword of light to her). She looks dumb as a sack of bricks.

Production Values

I was under the mistaken impression that this show had a budget, what with the decent CG sequences of space action at the beginning. However, the fantasy action sequences soon resort to still images animated by shaky-cam, and I realized that they’d blown all their cash on the first ten minutes.

Overall Impression

Gods, this is terrible. I didn’t have many expectations from an adaptation of manga that’s itself the sequel of a videogame, but this is by far the second worst show of the season so far. I especially appreciated the bit where it starts as a somewhat decent space opera (despite some warning signs like the insufferable protagonist), and then suddenly jumps into generic-fantasy-land. Way to kill my interest, show.

Blur effects shouldn't be a substitute for actual animation.
Blur effects shouldn’t be a substitute for actual animation.

via [In which I review] New anime, Spring 2001 – Page 3.

Dog Days

(12 episodes)

What’s it about ?

In a parallel fantasy world, war rages between the kingdom of Biscotti and the Galette Knights. A surprisingly PG war, with no casualties whatsoever and announcers providing step-by-step colour commentary. Oh, and they’ve all got animal ears and tails (Biscotti are dogs, and I think Galette are cats). Anyway, Biscotti are losing, so they call upon a hero from Earth to save them.

Characters

Shinku, our protagonist and ordinary high school student. He’s actually an accomplished athlete (coming second in the last big sports tournament, and assiduously training for improvement), and a bit of a showboat. When he’s transported to another world and called a hero, he muses that this must be a dream, so what the heck, and dives in with enthusiasm.

Milchore, the kid ruler of Biscotti, who summons Shinku and exposits the situation to him. She doesn’t show much personality yet, to be honest.

We get to see a few more Biscotti characters, including a couple of elite warriors who get rid of scores of enemy mooks in one spell. Er, weren’t they supposed to be losing ?

Although it might be because the top Galette Knights have yet to deploy – everyone says they’re very impressive, but I’ve yet to see any of that.

Production Values

By the makers of Nanoha ! So you get the obligatory OP by Nana Mizuki, bright and shiny colours everywhere, CG runes galore for every single spell, and loli-style character designs for nearly everyone important (except the “villains”).

Overall Impression

I’m not really sure what to think about this one.

I quite like the twist of war as a harmless sports-like competition, and Mamoru Miyano lends tons of his usual charisma to the protagonist. On the other hand, the Biscotti people are dull and sugary as hell, and the Galette Knights don’t show much promise either.

I’ll probably give it a couple more episodes before judging it.

via [In which I review] New anime, Spring 2011.

Rune Soldier Louie (Mahou Senshi Louie)

(24 episodes)

What’s it about ?

Comedic heroic-fantasy. Three female adventurers are looking for a magician to complete their party. A female one if possible, but the only one they find is a classic male lech who ain’t even much good at it.

Characters

The party is currenly comprised of Merril, the quick-tempered short Thief ; Genie, the amazon Warrior ; and Melissa, the not-that-pure Cleric (Kikuko Inoue in yet another of those self-parody roles – at this point I’m not even sure I remember her ever playing the perfect-woman type straight).

Presumably shortly joining them is Louie, our title character. He ain’t much good at magic (he apparently got into the Magic Academy through nepotism, and doesn’t pay attention to the lectures), and spends his time drinking in towns and leering at any girl he sees. His “accidental pervert” tendencies don’t help : he spends most of the episode either on the run or in jail.

There’s also Ila, his fellow student who’d like to be a bit more, wink wink nudge nudge (he’s totally oblivious). She’s prominently featured in the ED, so presumably the writers’ll find a way to keep her around despite her explicitly stating she has no interest in adventuring (much to the distress of the trio, who’d rather have her than Louie).

Production Values

It does the job, but just that. I’ll also note the rather high fanservice level (it’s mostly the “all in good fun” kind rather than anything skeevy, though).

Overall Impression

Hello, Slayers clone !

Okay, that’s a bit harsh. Especially as I find it quite funnier than its predecessor (mostly because I like the main characters more). Still, this looks like a bog-standard heroic-fantasy comedy… including the vague hints that it’ll get more serious once the real plot shows up.

I’m actually a bit curious on how it goes on : it looks like decent popcorn watching.

There's a perfectly rational explanation why Louie has barged into Melissa's "religious ceremony" and looks like he's about to rape her. Really.
There’s a perfectly rational explanation why Louie has barged into Melissa’s “religious ceremony” and looks like he’s about to rape her. Really.

via [In which I review] New anime, Spring 2001 – Page 3.