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All posts for the year 2011

Review: Hakuouki Hekketsu-roku (薄桜鬼 碧血録)

Posted by ranpha on 17th February 2011
Posted in: anime review. Tagged: , . Leave a Comment


The main female protagonist who owned a harem full with swords-toting pretty boys.

This review of the 10-episode Hakuouki Hekketsu-roku, the sequel of Hakuouki reviewed here before, is so late mainly because of Chinese New Year and a little bit procrastinating on my side. As a recap, the first season has done fairly well before during the ‘Anime of the Year 2010’ audition, and definitely the best reverse-harem title reviewed in this blog to date. So did the second season, which will also compete for the ‘Anime of the Year 2010’ title just like its predecessor did, continues building on the solid foundations that has already been laid? read on to find out.


She finally fulfill the reason why she comes to Kyoto in the first place.

Story:-
After the main female protagonist and her pretty boys entourage retreated from Kyoto, the Tokugawa Shogunate started to disintegrate while the era of the Meiji Restoration started to dawn in Japan. In the turmoil caused by the warring factions, she finally finds her missing father (and as an added bonus, her brother too) in tragic short-lived reunions. As history chiseled away the Shinsengumi group episode-by-episode, they has to fight monsters and demons too in addition of the imperial forces.

One thing that has definitely improved in the second season is the storyline. The fictional parts of this anime is more overt now than it is in the first season, and the only possible weakness in the plot is the appearance of the main female protagonist’s brother being too early for my liking. Actually, after learning that the second season only has 10 episodes, I feared that this anime will go the way of Hatenkou Yuugi (an extremely bad reverse harem title) but fortunately it didn’t. While it is all fine and dandy when it comes to storyline, the second season suffers a serious regression when it comes to presentation.


Considering the circumstances detailed in the first season, this character died too early for my liking.

In the first season, the anime’s pacing is quite decent if not a little bit fast because of the numerous time jumps, plus the flow of the story progression is basically flawless. But in the sequel, you cannot say the same thing for the presentation aspect of this title. The pacing in this sequel is faster than in the first, and because of it the improved storyline seems to be presented in a hurry. Events comes and goes faster than it is in the first season. This sets up a cascading chain reaction where the fast pacing also caused the flow of the storyline to be negatively affected.

A good example of this is the disconnects between the events of the main female protagonist brother’s death (in the first two episodes), the arrest and execution of the Shinsengumi leader (happened in the next two episodes) and also the death of the main female protagonist’s father (the next 3 episodes after it). Scene transition problems is really apparent in those cases, it is as if you are watching an episodic anime title. But this weakness is mitigated by the fact that the problem only happens in the fictional parts of the anime, not the historical parts of the storyline. The time jumps in this second season are still numerous as ever, but didn’t affect the anime negatively.

 
I’m pretty damn sure that the real Shinsengumi guys in our world doesn’t have to fight these guys.

Speaking about that, in my review of the first season, I did mention that I predict that the second season storyline will deviate from official history books. Fortunately, this doesn’t happen, and changes are restricted mostly on how some members of the Shinsengumi died. And those changes are most dictated by the emergence and resurgence of the fictional parts of this anime (consisted of parts like the main female protagonist and the Rasetsu monsters). The ending is good but ambiguous, but if you consider the way this anime treated its historical sources, it is not that hard to extrapolate what has really happened to the main male protagonist at the end. A few things left unfinished though, like what happened to the remaining two Shinsengumi members.


He is also not part of the canon history books.

Character developments in this anime has been improved compared to what happened in the first season, a great feat considering the lower numbers of episodes this anime has. Regardless whether a character is a Rasetsu or not, each and every one of them has decent airtime as the Shinsengumi numbers eventually wears down. Exceptions are the two characters I mentioned before which fate and whereabouts are unknown after the ending credits rolls in.

After watching all two season of this anime, IMO this is one of the better reverse harem titles out there; better than the likes of Ouran Koukou High School, La Corda D’Oro ~primo passo~ or Hatenkou Yuugi. If you have a thing for pretty boys and a penchant for documentaries, this is definitely a title for you.


The time jumps are still there in all its glory.

Character Design:-
My comment from the first season of this anime still applies.

Voice Acting:-
My comment from the first season of this anime still applies.

Music:-
Another part in this anime where improvements can actually be seen. The OST is still decent as it is in the first season, but in this season the OP/ED themes are actually good. The ED theme in particular is great.

Animation/Direction:-
For the animation and choreography parts, my comment from the first season of this anime still applies. But for the directing, the scene transition problems is a blip for the director.


Rain effects in this anime is better than the fake ones seen in Legend of Legendary Heroes and Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood.

Conclusion:-
8 out of 10. Same score as the first season, and therefore Katanagatari will still retain the ‘Anime of the Year 2010’ title for the time being. To know the next title I will watch, see the sidebar of this blog’s Facebook page. It is highly likely another 2010 anime title that should remain nameless until I started watching it.


Unfortunately for the audience, the anime doesn’t show what happened after this scene. Oh well, you have to settle for the Princess Lover OVA instead.

Shortlink: http://wp.me/prgSo-kE

Review: Katanagatari (刀語)

Posted by ranpha on 27th January 2011
Posted in: Anime of the Year 2010 title holder, anime review, STOP THAT BLURRY ANIMATION TECHNIQUE NOW!. Tagged: . Leave a Comment

 
The main male protagonist with a penchant for everything Canada.

As promised in my last blog entry for Legend of Legendary Heroes, I am going to review Katanagatari today. Written by the same person who also does Bakemonogatari (those two titles are not related though – but comparisons will be inevitable), this anime then will compete with K-On!! for the ‘Anime of the Year 2010’ title. And actually, this anime has a great chance to wrest the title from the latter. Read on to see whether this anime managed to do so or not.

Story:-
Our main male protagonist, part of a small family of swordsmen exiled to an island after a rebellion, was summoned by a representative of the reigning shogunate in a secret mission to find to 12 legendary swords forged by a famous swordsmith hundreds of years before. Incidentally, this anime has 12 monthly episodes, therefore he spent each episode seeking the sword of the month by fighting in the duel of the month, one month at a time (in the anime and also in real world).

The story in this anime is great, and just like in Bakemonogatari, has good pacing and flawless plot progression. One thing I like about the story is how in episode 4, the anime shows the main male protagonist sister’s battles instead of the duel of the century between the main protagonist and the strongest swordsman in ancient Japan, Sabi Hakuhei. The writer sure has a lot of balls to do such a radical thing, doing an extremely important story progression event off-screen while highlighting another event that is less important at that time. And this choice of events allows the writer to set up the duel of the millennium instead that occurred in episode 7. But a certain weakness of this anime somewhat reduced the impact that episode 7 should have had, and I will return to that later.

While the writer has flunked the ending of Bakemonogatari, this anime’s ending is solid and beautifully written (although it has a somewhat unbelievable longest ‘last words’ in anime history). The certain weakness I have mentioned before also affected the ending to a degree though, causing the presentation of the ending to be less than perfect. The ending isn’t written to accommodate a sequel though, so I do not expect to see one unlike Bakemonogatari.

Character development in this anime’s small cast of recurring characters is also done very well. The best and most interesting  characters in this anime are definitely the two main protagonists, each of them having their own character development strategies.

Character Design:-
Character designs in this anime is completely different than the one in Bakemonogatari. While the designs in the latter will be home in any Japanese shounen genre titles, the designs in this anime reminds me of Cartoon Network’s Samurai Jack. Black hair are common in this fictional Bakufu-era anime though, which is a good thing. A positive aspect for this anime.


Swords’ designs in this anime is mixed bag though, the above sword is one of the better designed ones.

Voice Acting:-
Voice acting in this anime is really good overall, and this is important because this title has a lot of dialogues. The main male protagonist and the princess are two outstanding characters in this regard. Another positive aspect for this anime.

Music:-
The OST in this anime is decent. But from the very many OP/ED themes in this anime, only the 1st OP theme and the 1st and 5th ED themes are any good.

Animation/Direction:-
In some certain fast-paced action scenes, but not all of them, the blurry animation technique are used, therefore one point will be docked from this anime final evaluation. A pity because Bakemonogatari doesn’t have the same problem. Apart from that, the animation quality in this anime is good, even in fast-paced scenes.

The main weakness I have mentioned in the story section above is the almost below average choreography that this anime has. When I first start watching this anime and see that the main male protagonist is a swordsman that doesn’t use swords, I started to imagine a character whose abilities is similar to Mou Ming (‘Nameless’ or ‘Tanpa Nama’ as we call him in these shores) from the Hong Kong wuxia comic titled ‘Fung Wan’. But what you got instead is a character whose fighting skills is not too much different than Sanji in One Piece. The only difference between them is that the main male protagonist uses his hand more often in battles (if he is not using it to stroke hairs of little young girls).

mouming_x_sanji
I expect a hero similar to the one at the left, but what you get is someone similar to the one at the right.

Therefore, with the main male protagonist best described as a street brawler instead of a swordsman (weaponless or not), the fighting sequences in this is pretty much ordinary at best, most of the time. Remember the decision to not show the duel of the century between the main male protagonist and Sabi Hakuhei in episode 4, while using the said episode as a springboard for the sibling’s duel of the millennia. A duel of the millennia deserve awesome fighting scenes right? Right?

Unfortunately, the duel of the millennia, between two siblings of all things (showing the excellent build-ups by the writer that starts from episode 4) consists of lame fighting scenes that doesn’t deserve its title. While the writing is good, the execution is not, and this caused episode 7 to be less stellar than it should be. The average choreography also affected the events in the final episode, but not as much as it does to episode 7. Only the duel between the main male protagonist and the robo-sword in episode 8 has somewhat decent choreography in it.

The directing is flawless, and the director uses some good camera angles in certain scenes.

Conclusion:-
9 out of 10, despite the choreography problems mentioned above. Only the usage of the blurry animation technique prevents this anime from getting a perfect score. With this, this anime will replace K-On!! as the newest ‘Anime of the Year 2010’ title holder, with its strong storyline and also strong ending. As for the next title that I will review next, those who visit this blog’s Facebook page will know what it is already, because this anime is the third from four titles I wanted to watch.

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Review: Legend of Legendary Heroes (伝説の勇者の伝説)

Posted by ranpha on 18th January 2011
Posted in: anime review, STOP THAT BLURRY ANIMATION TECHNIQUE NOW!. Tagged: , . Leave a Comment


The main male protagonist, and also one of the best characters in this anime.

After being preempted by me watching The World God Only Knows, my plan to watch both Katanagatari and The Legend of Legendary Heroes will now proceed as planned. I will start with the latter first, and that title will compete with K-On!! for the ‘Anime of the Year 2010’ title. But let me just tell you one thing first; this anime won’t be able to wrest the title from K-On!! for a couple of reasons that will be mentioned below.

Story:-
Set up in a fantasy world, the main male protagonist has been ordered by his white-haired man-lover country king to find the ancient relics from the ancient era where the legendary heroes slayed the demons + monsters and rescued the world from devastation. Alas, the history is not exactly straightforward even in the fairy-tale world the anime is set up in, therefore the story quickly veered into Tytania’s territory, full with drama but without the war mind games though.

I actually expect a bog-standard fantasy storyline not unlike The Sacred Blacksmith but instead what you can get here is a storyline that is borderline seinen, and definitely can be dubbed as the lite version of Legend of Galactic Heroes. The only thing this anime lacks when compared to Legend of Galactic Heroes is the highly-sophisticated space warfare, but the background drama plots is made of solid writing as magical techniques and swordsmanship skills replaced the lasers and missiles from that venerable space opera. Too bad that the story haven’t concluded though, and there is no news about a new second season as of writing. The ending is written exactly to accommodate one, and many loose ends in the story are still not tied up yet.

The first reason why this anime failed to dethrone K-On!! from the ‘Anime of the Year 2011’ throne is the presentation. Here, I’m referring to the two (or is it three?) flashback prologue episodes that happened early in the series. Flashback episodes by itself is not a bad thing (see Saki) but what I don’t like in this anime’s flashback episodes is the fact that they doesn’t do their intended purposes well. They advanced the main story, but did not clarify gaps in the timeline fully. Some events are not shown at all, and only the end results are shown. This is probably the first time ever I have seen the flashback plot device being used on a plot that is better explained with a more conventional storytelling technique. IMO flashbacks are better used to clarify things, like telling the audience about the background of a character or chronicling a historical event. The flashback episodes in this anime does the latter very poorly, with the gaps and all that.

Nevertheless, if we were to ignore the fact that the flashback plot device is being used to portray the early parts of the anime, the storyline flow smoothly although the pacing is a bit slower than expected (slower for sure than the one in The Sacred Blacksmith). This may have to do with all of those political dramas that sometimes threatened to overwhelm the action part in this anime. While not as good and intense as the dramas in Legend of Galactic Heroes, they are still enjoyable as the proverb ‘The road to hell is paved with good intentions’ slowly comes to fruition. This anime has a pressing need for a second season, just like Tytania is, because there are many loose ends that still have a long way to go.

Character development is also where this anime has done very well. The character roster in this anime is large, but yet almost everyone has appropriate character developments related to their respective roles. The best characters in this anime are definitely the two main male protagonists, whose friendship that is borderline romantic, and are the cornerstones of this anime. One of the mysteries I hoped will be answered in a potential second season is definitely whether they will be together forever at the end. Sorry I have to say to the blond swordswoman and the captain of the Taboo Breaker Squad; both of you won’t get him. He will definitely become the queen of the country.

Character Design:-
The character design in this anime is no different than the ones seen in The Sacred Blacksmith and Tytania, amongst others. Black hairs are ultra-rare in this anime, understandably so. But the main male protagonist was called ‘Black-haired demon’ or something like that even when his hair color is brown. A positive aspect for this anime.

Voice Acting:-
Overall, voice acting in this anime is good, with the two main protagonist being the best from all the large characters’ cast in this title. But to see a flawless voice acting gigs from everyone in this anime is a miracle by itself, considering the large size of the cast that increase the probability of bad gigs. A positive aspect for this anime.

Music:-
The only good thing musically in this anime is the 2nd OP theme. The OST and the rest of the OP/ED themes are either non-existent (the former) or simply not good enough.


The fake rain effect found in Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood can also be seen here.

Animation/Direction:-
The second reason why this anime won’t dethrone K-On!! from the ‘Anime of the Year 2010’ throne is because this anime uses the blurry animation technique I have mentioned before in this blog, usually in action scenes. See my reviews of past anime titles in this link to see what I am talking about. Using that animation technique results on an automatic one-point deduction from me.

Apart from that, the animation quality in this anime is decent, all around, even in fast-paced scenes. Choreography is just average though, with too much dependence on visual special effects than on actual good action. The directing is good with the exception of choosing the flashback method at the start of the anime.

Conclusion:-
7 out of 10. Could have been better, but a sequel for this series is fully deserved. The next title that will be reviewed here is Katanagatari; I heard good things from it. Maybe a new ‘Anime of the Year 2010’ will be born?


And just like in Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood, the main male protagonist will be opening 'doors' in this anime.

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