bingerama

http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/anime.php?id=844

I actually don’t have much to say about this anime, but I finished it (and we all know how rare it is that I finish anything) and took screenshots so I figured I might as well.

I might get in trouble for saying this, but this was such a mediocre anime. I mean, the story was just not very interesting. The whole Sousuke in school situation has a lot of potential for hilarity of course, but that’s explored in Fumoffu (which, as an attempt at redemption, I shall state that I have found very enjoyable so far) rather than here. I still don’t get who the bad guy was working for, what he was trying to do, and WHY HIS ROBOT HAS HAIR. WHY?? I also don’t get why Sousuke and Kaname have lines on their cheeks. No one else has them. What are they supposed to signify?

I do like the opening theme though. And I definitely like that the main character is played by the ever endearing Seki Tomokazu. Aside from that, this is why I don’t watch mecha animes. Pfft.

http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/anime.php?id=6430

Finally got round to watching this after hearing about all the rave reviews. But first, please take an extra moment to appreciate the nice screenshots. It took me a whole hour to take and edit those thanks to the wordy narration (too many subs in the way) and because I had such a hard time choosing only 3 Yuki shots out of her plethora of cuteness.

Like everyone else, I thought the story telling was pretty well done. I liked the random insertion of nothingey episodes in absolutely no order. I even liked the heater episode where nothing happened at all. It was just so entertaining to watch, regardless of content. The only thing is that, like TJ commented, this anime had so much potential to be hilarious, and it didn’t quite get there. It was funny for sure, but not as funny as it could have been. And what was up with all the fan service? Was that supposed to be a parody? If it was, why was there so much of it? Or was it because it was meant to be a parody that there was so much? In any case, if it was meant to be a parody it clearly failed to present itself as so, and if it wasn’t meant to be a parody, that’s just outright failness.

Kyon was by far the best thing about this show. I’ve always thought Sugita Tomokazu was just so-so, but he did a singularly outstanding job here. I’ve never been as impressed with the portrayal of a character as much as I am with this. Haruhi didn’t strike me as particularly interesting, and she gets kinda grating sometimes. Mikuru just hellllllllla gets on my nerves. But this is all made up by Yuki’s incredible cuteness, which I am very partial to (as evidenced by aforementioned screenshots). So so so so so so so cute!

Also like everyone else, I really enjoyed the 2 insert songs Haruhi played, especially when I manage to ignore the parts with bad English (remind me again why they do that?). And I currently have Kyon’s version of Hare Hare Yukai stuck in my head. If you haven’t heard it you should check it out, I think it’s pretty cute in a lol-poor-dude kinda way.

I didn’t rate this very high, just cos (a) I only REALLY REALLY like a story when it provokes enough emotion to make me cry and (b) I didn’t really get the sense that there was an overarching message (although I know this is not necessarily what an anime like this one would seek to convey). But it was still hugely enjoyable. Definitely looking forward to season 2!

I made TJ watch this and we finished it over the weekend, with me re-watching 18 episodes in the process. Sadly, most of these episodes were not as moving the second time around. Plus TJ has a heart of stone so he was quite unimpressed with most of the tear-jerking moments in the anime, which kinda spoiled the mood for me. =/

This would have ranked as one of my all time favourites, except that the ending was quite a let down. It felt like nothing was really resolved in the greater scheme of things, and no ultimate enemy was finally triumphed over. I would have let the lack of an explanation pass, if they hadn’t slipped in that little bit about the ‘Masterminds’, which seemed to imply that we would be getting a bit more information about the whole affair. But nope, 30 hour long fight and zip, ending credits. And what was with the half hearted flashbacks in the last episode that seemed to accidentally leave out half the cast?

I was also disappointed by the weak stories that Jun and Kanji ended up with, especially since they’d managed to groom Kanji into such a likeable character without giving him a real focus. He almost made my list of favourite anime characters, but his story turned out to be entirely pointless. Pfft. Thankfully, all these faults can be conveniently blamed on the fact that the manga is still ongoing.

I still really liked the individual stories. I think the anime did an excellent job getting you attached to the characters (some of them anyway) when there were so many sharing limited screentime. The general premise of the story is sad to begin with, and the way the characters were presented made it downright heartbreaking in some cases. Even the ending was quite poignant, despite its insufficiencies. I probably would have cried if TJ hadn’t been around making snide remarks.

What I liked best about this anime was the fact that it didn’t try to be anything more than it was. It wasn’t pretentious, it didn’t try to be different or unique just for the sake of novelty, it didn’t try to get you to like the characters by applying all the usual techniques. It told its story without fillers or fanfare and still managed to be entertaining and, in my opinion anyway, genuinely touching.

http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/anime.php?id=7382

I’m not sure why the ‘BLACK’ in the title is capitalised, like it’s supposed to have any meaning aside from just the colour. Maybe it is a reference to the fact that the main character’s name is Hei (black in Mandarin) and he wears black when he’s in ass kicking mode, in which case the ‘Darker than’ doesn’t quite make sense. Perhaps this is something that will come to light later in the series and justify the ridiculously poser title?

The show is set in futuristic Japan, where some kind of mysterious field called Hell’s Gate has appeared and reduced the area around it to a toxic wasteland, which the government has built a wall around to contain. The appearance of this field has also created a race of beings called ‘Contractors’, who have assorted super powers, and who have to pay some form of obeisance after they used their powers (a little twist that I found quite interesting). These Contractors are also somehow linked to stars (maybe not real stars, but lights generated by Hell’s Gate that look like stars? no clue) and so can be studied and analyzed by the Astronomy department according to the way their stars move, which is another plot piece that I think is rather fascinating.

I’m currently totally hooked on this and I don’t know why. It’s one of those things that you can’t put down to any one concrete element of the show. It’s a combination of the soundtrack, the animation, the story, the script and just the general feeling you get that makes you want to keep watching. It’s weird cos this anime isn’t exactly the happy happy feel good kinda thing - in the first 5 minutes of the first episode you see this guy breaking his own fingers with his bare hands, which is pretty damn disturbing in my opinion. But I’m totally hooked. I really like Hei’s character, maybe because he’s so adorable when he’s acting like a normal human being that he’s extra hot when he’s playing the assassin dude.

The only thing that I’ve found unsatisfactory so far is that Miki Shinichiro is playing a character that is not incredibly charming. Boo.