Hi I'm Dranzerstorm
You may remember me as a regular contestant on the caption battle contest.
Welcome to Retro Retrospective, my world dedicated to the old guard of the Otaku world; expect some reviews of the old & obscure, and in-depth geeky knowledge with the occasional top ten and I now have a logo.
Little info about me
Well I'm British and I'm in to all things animated and nostalgia.
I've grown up with every cartoon going and have watched hundreds of anime.
Oh and to answer a question I was asked once, no I don't wear glasses in real life, I would wear Loke's sunglasses though.
I was meant to post this yesterday but I was so tired I practically passed out on the bed. As a way of releasing the stress of what has been a very difficult year, the month of November I will be reviewing some terrible cartoons and anime, requests are open and I may have to miss a couple of days due to an imminent house move so I start the ball rolling with Goldie Gold and Action Jack.
Goldie Gold is the world's richest girl and addicted to action, protecting her is reporter action Jack who together uncover crimes and stop evil organisations with the power of bottomless money.
First problem of this series is obvious, how absurd Goldie's unending supply of riches is as she seems to get out of all problems through convenient gadgets and seems to have a mansion in every possible place in the world.
Second problem is that Action Jack is a terrible bodyguard as his attempts at saving the day are easily thwarted by the episode villain.
And finally both are generally terrible at their jobs as they seem to botch their way out of trouble either through convenient gadgets or dumb luck when they should've been killed at least 25 times that's two per episode.
The plot is ridiculous, the characters are incompetent and it's an obvious Richie Rich knock off.
I normally refrain from ranting about anything but I feel the recent controversy around this show needs clearing up.
High Guardian Spice is a show that streaming site Crunchyroll is producing as it makes strides in trying to compete on the level of Netflix but the trailer had people talking and here's why.
1. It's not even a trailer, it's much closer to a behind the scenes documentry.
2. From what we know of the basic premise it's a show that looks to be jumping on the recent sucess of My Hero Academia a.k.a the trend of having a school for anything including heroes, guardians or hunters.
3. It's designs are generic and wouldn't be out of place in precure or little witch academia.
4. It mentions a lot about the diversity of it's staff being all female despite the fact that's actually not diversity, please read a dictionary.
5. Previous attempts at marketing a product with it's diversity didn't end well.
6. Just by criticizing this series I'll be classed as ignorant to diversity despite the fact that I'm a supporter of free love for everyone.
7. I don't even know who this series is meant for.
8. Crunchyroll have enough problems since they lost their partnership with Funimation which may lose subscriptions along with some seriously popular shows.
9. The track record for any Western anime series is not great unless your series is Avatar or it was made in France.
10. The Anime and Manga community has never needed help promoting diversity because due to the fact that the Japanese cater for everyone and rarely censor creative freedom you get the broadest most diverse range in the world and no other medium comes close to what it offers; and if your still not convinced here's a list.
Son Goku the most recognised hero of anime has always been voiced by a female VA in Japan.
CLAMP a group of female manga artists have been producing manga for over 30 years long before all female creators became a trend.
Rumiko Takahashi is frequently regarded as the highest paid manga artist.
The longest running anime of all time is about a middle aged woman and her family.
You get the point, diversity is the last thing anime and manga need help with and with it's sub cultures of LGBT friendly shows and frequently ambiguous gendered characters and the general acceptance of all diversities any talk of thinking it's not will be ignored.
May have to bring riot gear for this review, time to review Rick and Morty.
Rick Sanchez is a brilliant scientist however he's a drunk, a deadbeat dad, a sociopath and pretty much has very little or no respect for the human race nor does he care what happens to them as he can change reality in his favour to get out of trouble.
Morty is his grandson and is dragged along for the ride as he joins Rick on his adventures through the multiverse whether he wants to or not.
This is a show on adult swim and despite the amount of people who have told me this is a super intelligent series with mature humour and I need the same level of intelligence to quote on quote "understand it" or be autistic, which I am and by not liking it I'm considered too dumb to enjoy real entertainment.
My verdict: It's okay.
It's definitely one of the best shows adult swim have made but it's not actually the ground-breaking best cartoon ever that everyone praises it to be.
I can enjoy the content it has on screen but with its edge towards ultra violence and the central joke being that its not a good idea to go on adventures with Doctor Who's drunken uncle because you'll probably destroy reality/time/human race just makes the show run on the same level as other adult swim shows with the same violence and mature content, and by that regard it means that I've seen it all before and this is no different and you can't mask it by saying it has a higher IQ.
Again this doesn't mean I hate it but it's nothing I haven't seen before on other adult shows; am I missing something that others see? Maybe but if I'm supposed to understand certain references or need to prove my intelligence to be allowed to even critique this series then that's not going to make me like it more.
If you haven't guessed my most recent trend of reviews I'm tackling modern cartoon network so next for the chopping block is Apple & Onion.
In the world of food people two young adults leave their homes in the boonies to experience life in the city and by a series of unfortunate events end up meeting and becoming friends, they are Apple & Onion, ummm how to describe them? Well this term shows my age, they are dorks; I really can't say much more than that. Okay to be fair they are a lot easier on the senses than it's contemporaries, Pickle & Peanut comes to mind as it pretty much rips them off even going down to the fact that they fail at singing popular music and work in convenience stores. The only difference is Apple & Onion's stories can be broken down into problem, fix, happy ending with a naive charm whereas Pickle & Peanut has pretty much the same thing but are dumb asses painted to a cynical out dated Ren & Stimpy color palette.
So is it good? The fact that Disney already tried this already gives this show a bad mark, it is better but it's like being bad at cooking, adding salt to a failed recipe might make it edible but it's still the same dish.
I asked one of my friends for a suggestion on what to review next and it had to be something terrible, obscure or random and I was given Kakegurui.
Hyakkaou Academy is a school run by gambling, to get into a high position you must be willing to bet high stakes, those who win get the high praise and status of the student council, those who lose become house pets drowning in debt who are nothing more than playthings for the victors.
Things change when Yumeko Jabami enrolls and straight away she dismantles the establishment one student at a time but what is her goal? Well nothing she's a compulsive gambler who just loves gambling, seriously that's her only motivation for the whole series, it's not like Yugi Moto who gambles for the sake of saving his friends or Rio Rollins whose gambling makes people happier, she just loves gambling.
If there is a plus to this series it really does show gambling in all it's sinister glory and the live action version looks more fun and the concept has worked before in the pre duel monsters YuGiOh but my god with no character motivation and facial expressions that makes every character look like they're passing a kidney stone it's impossible to take seriously and makes the whole show look dumb. Dub is passable and if this is the best Netflix can offer other than Seven Deadly Sins I don't plan on subscribing any time soon.
Final Verdict: the concept works but the lack of character motivation and the over the top facial expressions make this series utterly dumb to watch, there's a second season starting next year but the anime has shown it's entire hand there's nothing left to surprise me and it's not worth continuing.