Wow, I haven't updated this thing in more than three months. Now that our worlds are being ranked and all, I suppose I'd better get crackin'!
So - there's a new season with a truckload of brand new shows, and I'm slowly sifting through them all to decide what I wouldn't mind wasting several more hours of my life with. My preliminary list for keepers and on-the-bubble series is below. Keep in mind that there's a bunch of stuff that I haven't watched yet, and quite a few things that (for various reasons) I'll probably never get to - this especially includes sequels to shows I never finished.
KEEPERS:
-Michiko to Hatchin - ties Kurozuka for the best first episode of the season. This one's apparently a rather fun new-town-per-episode kind of adventure series starring a femme fatale, her bike and automatic weaponry, and a little girl along for the ride. Borrows more than a little from Cowboy Bebop stylistically, but I can't find myself complaining too much - Shinichiro Watanabe's fingerprints are all over this, in any case. I'd also like to point out that the first episode has bar none the single most cathartic moment I've seen in anime so far this year (you'll know it when you see it). Definitely a keeper.
-Kurozuka - looks to be an ultraviolent historical samurai epic. Think... I don't know, Gungrave with swords maybe. Not too much of any depth to talk about so far, but the art for this series is so good that I refuse to pass it up until the budget runs out. My guess is that this is the season's 500-pound gorilla, folks; this is the show to beat.
-Nodame Cantabile, Paris Chapter - still one of the best romantic comedy animes ever made, and still infuriating for a music guy like me. Nodame and Chiaki move to Paris, where they... continue to play the same goddamned German stuff, heavy on romanticism, that was everywhere in the previous series. Including a piece in the second episode by the famous HAYDON (it's there, keep your eyes peeled). God, this show makes me want to punch a wall sometimes. One would at least expect a show based in France to ratchet down die Deutsche Musik just a touch; one recalls Satie's famous line about how he wanted music without any sauerkraut in it.
-To Aru Majutsu no Index - I took a bit of a chance giving this one a second episode, and I'm glad I did. For my efforts, it rewarded me with the best action setpiece in months, involving a mage, a fire deity of some kind, and a guy with an unlucky hand (it makes sense when you see it). Nothing particularly adventurous here - you've got a dopey guy surrounded by a set of eligible superpowered young ladies, and they go on adventures. Think of it as Tenchi Muyo if Tenchi had an anti-Midas touch.
-Toradora - Nodame may be the old hand here, but so far Toradora's the romantic comedy to beat this season. In fact, I'd say it's the best romantic comedy series since Lovely Complex, and it compares curiously well to that show in other respects (tall male and short female this time, rather than the other way around). A guy and gal conspire to hook one another up with their respective crushes, and all the while said guy and gal refuse to recognize that each is absolutely retarded for the other. Sure it's formulaic, but like some of the other shows on this list I can't in good conscience give up on anything this well done.
ON THE BUBBLE:
-Hokuto no Ken, Raou's Story - I honestly wasn't holding out much hope on this one, but then halfway through the first episode bodies started exploding and techniques started getting yelled and it was like I'd come home again. It's trash, of course, but like a certain grouch I've been known to enjoy my trash on occasion.
-Chaos;HEAd - now, this is one I'd been looking forward to. Dagger in particular got me frothing out the mouth for it. Even so, I found myself glancing at my watch far, far too often during the opening 24 minutes. It came across a bit like NHK ni Youkuso meets Jigoku Shoujo - which for me, being a big fan of neither series, is not so appealing. It's got a great premise and it sounds fantastic on paper (this alone scores it another few episodes), but so far I'm a bit underwhelmed. Well, we'll see.
-Today in Class 5-2 - I like to believe that the folks who watched Tenchi Universe after having memorized the OVAs felt more or less the same thing that I feel watching this thing. That is to say, I feel like a good franchise has let me down. The original Kyou no 5-2 OVAs were, without question, the filthiest damn animes I had ever seen. No, really - I've seen a lot of really questionable things, and this was worse than all of those. It was, at the same time, deeply funny in a Porkys sort of way. The TV series here, on the other hand, feels cheapened and watered down in every respect. I don't feel like I need a shower after watching it, for one thing. And really, if I don't... then what's the point?
-Macademi Wasshoi - those of you who didn't think Negima ripped off Harry Potter enough, boy howdy do I have a series for you. This is yet another mess of a harem series, complete with an inarticulate demon/whatever girl nyaa-ing her way about the screen and a mostly-shy yandere meganekko. Again: trash, but I'm not at all adverse to trash.
Well, that's about all. Sorry again about not updating, y'all - I'm very, very busy with schoolwork nowadays. You might have more luck catching me in chat, especially in Movie Sign. For now, though, it's back to reading Descartes and outlining term papers...
