anime review

All reviews written since I moved the blog to the wordpress platform. Default category.

Review: Soul Eater (ソウルイーター)

Posted by ranpha on 7th October 2010

Posted in: anime review. Tagged: Soul Eater (ソウルイーター). Leave a Comment

The main protagonist, whose name is used as the title of this anime.

In the end, I chose to watch the 51-episode (and not 50 as mentioned in my last blog entry) anime series titled Soul Eater, instead of the much shorter and recently finished High School of the Dead. The latter will definitely be reviewed here next though, because it is a high-priority title. Soul Eater is a 2008 anime, therefore it will fight the current ‘Anime of the Year 2008’ incumbent, One Outs and lose.

This is him alongside his partner in crime.

Story:-
Set up in a made-up version of our world where witches and demons are pretty much part of the fabric of society, three technicians and their shape-shifting companions enrolls in a certain vocational high-school as they aspires to make death scythes out from 99 wicked men and the soul of a witch. Unknown to them, the school hid a terrible secret and a ~~snakey~~ sneaky witch is planning to expose the secret out and exploit it for her nefarious experiments…

Based on a manga that I didn’t read (but probably will after #lurk@irc.irchighway.net goes up again), this 51-episode anime series initially followed the manga storyline for the first-half of the series’ run before deviating from the source material in the second-half right after the end of the Kishin revival arc. This is kinda like what happened in the original Fullmetal Alchemist anime series. How on earth I seem to know about this even if I have not read a single chapter of the manga? The answer lies with the plethora of plot holes that this anime has, as a result from the deviating second-half plots that doesn’t address some questions that the canon first-half of the anime has raised.

I will list some of the most obvious plot holes seen in the anime as my example:-

Why is that the witch conducts the ‘black blood’ experiment? Is it to awaken the original Kishin? Or is it to create a new one by using Crona?
If it was the latter, why is that after swallowing a huge amount of souls in the Black Dragon episode, Crona doesn’t seem to advance towards becoming Kishin at all, or having her power upgraded? Even Shinigami-sama made an off-hand comment about this question, which is not answered even after the final episode finished playing.
If it was the former, then why on earth the witch took the extraordinary but ultimately successful effort to awaken the original Kishin anyway? From my point of view, the witch doesn’t seem to be beholden at all to the original Kishin, unlike her older sister. Did she does so so that Kishin will destroy the school? If yes, wouldn’t it be far less riskier if she just pursued the second option of turning Crona into a new Kishin that she can control instead of awakening the original Kishin who are unpredictable at the best of times? After all, she has gone on record saying that the black blood research is successful. Plus, if she really wants to destroy the school using Kishin (original one or not), the anime doesn’t even state why on earth she wants to do so (revenge, curiosity or just being evil) unlike her older sister who has a real beef with the school.

The above list is simply just samples of the numerous plot-holes this anime has. I have a feeling that the snake witch in the manga will be significantly different than the one in the anime, and the black blood’s role will be even more prominent than it is outside its anime role of being the source of power-ups for the series’ main pairing. The same thing can also be said for some of the other side-characters too, but I hope Excalibur is not one of them. This kind of plot-holes doesn’t exist in the first Fullmetal Alchemist anime, which shows why that anime is one of the best shounen anime out there.

Of course, in any given shounen anime title, the hero must also has a pet that can obligatorily talk!

The presentation is not flawless, with the anime starting quite slowly for the first quarter of the anime before settling down nicely just before the Kishin revival arc started. The Kishin revival arc is definitely the best arc in this series, and I stay up late watching 15 episodes in a single sitting at this phase. Consider that arc as this anime’s own version of the Soul Society arc (although the manga may have better arcs later in the timeline). Storyline progression is profoundly affected by the plot-holes mentioned earlier and also by some of the filler episodes, and the ending (definitely not derived from the manga) is stupendously underwhelming, ordinary and frustrating.

Character developments in this anime happened in two phases. In the first phase, when this anime still sticks with the source manga material, character developments are tepid at best, where you can see low character improvements despite the amount of character-specific episodes. In the second phase, where the anime started to deviate from the manga, character developments accelerates rapidly, usually during fights and sometimes illogically. And this happen despite there are fewer of those character-specific episodes that other anime titles will use to advance their character developments. There are no best character here in this anime because of this.

This anime can probably be salvaged if there is a second season for this long series. But alas, from the ANN page linked above, I don’t see any coming soon. The ending was not written to accommodate one anyway. Kishin is dead, and he wouldn’t have died if he reads this website.

The hero's cliques must also have a comic relief character, and he occupied that position with panache.

Character Design:-
The character designs in this anime is very good, and the lack of black hairs is forgiven in a setting where witches and shape-shifting humans abound. A positive aspect for this anime.

Voice Acting:-
This is where another of my complaint will come in. The first moment the main title male protagonist opened his mouth, I realized that we have another casting problem in hand here (like Lum, Excel et. al.). His voice actor is probably more suited to voice the pistol dual-wielder or the zombie teacher (those two original voice actors are fine though). The main male protagonist could have done with a more youthful voice, such as the one Black Star has. Then again, having two characters with huge airtime and with similar voice acting mannerisms is probably not a very good idea. Anyway, I simply learn to ignore it after 10 episodes or so. The director should have picked a better voice actor for him, that is of course also different than the one Black Star has.

Overall, if you count out the main male protagonist, voice acting gigs in this anime is great. The best character in this regard is definitely the main female protagonist, whose voice actress has completely outdone her colleagues in this anime. Her performances also mitigates the disaster that is the main male protagonist. A positive aspect for this anime.

Ass-poking – just one of the comedic moments in this anime.

Music:-
The OST in this anime is decent enough for me, but only the 2nd OP and the 1st ED themes are good themes.

Animation/Direction:-
The animation quality in this anime is very good, even in fast-paced scenes. Choreography is mixed bag; for fights where techniques are not used (read: most brawls at the early parts of the anime), the choreography is good while for fights where fighting techniques are prominent (read: basically almost all battles at the end of the anime), the choreography is below average. The director screwed up with the plot management, and he has not done anything that can redeem that mistake.

He described my feeling as the final credits rolls in.

Conclusion:-
6 out of 10. The next review is definitely for HighSchool of the Dead. Look for it to come in the very near future.

Some retarded filler episodes exists in this anime, featuring a certain character that didn't matter. Then again, if he really matters in this anime, he will make short work out of the Kishin and the witches, cutting down this anime episode count to 12 episodes or something. Is that a good thing?

Shortlink: http://wp.me/prgSo-i3

Review: Giniro no Olynssis (銀色のオリンシス)

Posted by ranpha on 26th September 2010

Posted in: anime review. Tagged: Giniro no Olynssis (銀色のオリンシス). Leave a Comment

The main male protagonist, alongside one of his comrades.

In the end, I picked the 12-episode mecha anime series titled Giniro no Olynssis instead of the mystery 50-episode I mentioned in my previous blog entry, therefore this very entry comes out relatively very early indeed. Giniro no Olynssis is a 2006 anime, therefore it will be able to challenge the current ‘Anime of the Year 2006’ incumbent, Chocotto Sister. The latter being one of the weaker ‘Anime of the Year’ title holders in this blog, can this mecha anime fire its way to the throne?

To Shinsen-Sub fansub group, the Japanese dialogues in these two scenes could have been translated into a slightly better English that will not cause misunderstandings amongst those with perverted minds, you know, people like me.

Story:-
Sometime in the far future, the post-apocalyptic Earth was infested by plenty of strange machines called Gardeners, whose hobby includes shooting lasers and firing homing missiles against the pockets of humanity that still remains. Our main male protagonist is a member of a group of hunters whose job is to fire back lasers and homing missiles against those Gardeners, which is a back-breaking high-risk repetitive job at the best of times. But out of the blue, his job suddenly become so much easier after he meets a mysterious girl who then gifted him a big bad-ass mecha that he can use to automate his routine job, while cutting down the risk to the very minimum. And of course, he got the girl too, which is a nice bonus!

The story itself is decent although unlike the most recent mecha anime reviewed here Kurogane no Linebarrels, which is a bog-standard shounen title, this anime veers dangerously very close to the kiddy genre territory. The story’s presentation is definitely not this anime’s best aspect, with the first two or three episodes started in such a convoluted manner it is hard for me to decipher what exactly is going on as the story unfolds. The flow of the storyline stabilized as I reached the middle part of the anime though. Surprisingly the pacing is not affected by the haphazard start, but despite the lack of pacing-killer filler episodes, it (the pacing) is still a bit on a slow side.

Having a kiddy-grade storyline (I would not be surprised if the likes of TV-Nihon fansub group is the one that translated this title instead of Shinsen-Subs) means that this anime cannot escape all of the clichés that is associated with the genre. There are no attempts whatsoever to sanitize the storyline the way Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann does. The multiple-character romance subplot in this anime is better than the one in Kurogane no Linebarrels though, and that’s a good thing. The ending is pretty conservative (you shouldn’t really expect more from a kiddy anime title) which makes it predictable, but provides a somewhat ambiguous but still good end to the anime.

Character development in this anime is narrow and probably nearly non-existent. Thinking about this again, it probably really non-existent. The main male protagonist is a static character from the start until the end (relying too much on the mecha power of his) and the main female protagonist depends on the ‘recovering from amnesia’ plot device TWICE to develop her character. That’s pretty much retarded, because using that plot device twice is simply doing it once too many times. Meanwhile, the ‘mysterious babe’ is too secretive for her own good, and the rest of the hunting group are simply there to act as props for the others, except maybe two of them. And that’s a very big ‘maybe’. Therefore, there are no best character(s) I can anoint in this title.

There is nothing that the Shinsen-Subs' translator can do with this shocking naive request from the main female protagonist though. Perverted main female protagonist that anyone will want to bang is still a pervert.

Character Design:-
The main reason why I choose to watch this anime is because it has the same character designer as Kurogane no Linebarrels is, and this anime didn’t disappoint in this aspect. Lack of black hair and abundance of other colors like brown and pink is forgiven in any given setting that involves a post-apocalyptic Earth. And I think the characters in this anime are supposed to be North Americans too, despite names like ‘Tokito’ and ‘Misuzu’. Mecha designs are decent, at least for the black, gold and silver mechas. Monster designs, not so much. A positive aspect for this anime.

Voice Acting:-
It is hard for me to say this, but some of the voice acting in this anime looks and sounds too wooden! The character that pilots the TF-21 is the main culprit, but hell he is not alone. The main male protagonist was also caught red-handed at being wooden at certain scenes, I think near the end of this series. To make it worse, this anime doesn’t have any good voice acting gigs in here, with most of them are just average.

Music:-
The OST in this anime is good, but you cannot say the same thing about any of the OP/ED themes.

Animation/Direction:-
This anime has some jerky animation problems with character animations, although not as bad as what you can see in Mayoi Neko Overrun. General animation quality is good, inclusive of fast-paced scenes. Choreography of action scenes is just average. The directing may have screwed up the early parts of this anime, but has done a relative good job after that. He/she should have ordered a retake for some of the obvious wooden voice acting in this anime though.

Conclusion:-
7 out of 10. Incidentally, High School of the Dead has already finished airing this week. I wonder whether I should watch that 2010 anime or the mysterious 50-episode anime title (this is a very popular title) I have mentioned before. Indecision abounds…

This forgetful main female protagonist is a living proof that huge amount of pain can really cure amnesia!

Shortlink: http://wp.me/prgSo-hX

Review: Oh! Edo Rocket (大江戸ロケット)

Posted by ranpha on 23rd September 2010

Posted in: anime review, STOP THAT BLURRY ANIMATION TECHNIQUE NOW!. Tagged: Oh! Edo Rocket (大江戸ロケット). Leave a Comment

The main male protagonist, given some man-love by the best character in this anime.

The random anime picked out for a review from my very large queue that spanned 2 terabytes worth of hard disk space is a 26-episode 2007 anime titled Oh! Edo Rocket. Naturally, this anime then will have the right to challenge the reigning ‘Anime of the Year 2007’ title holder Bokurano. Also, well, naturally, Bokurano makes short work out of this anime, for reasons that will be outlined in the review below.

The best character of this anime sure has a thing for the male populations of Edo.

Story:-
Taking place in ancient Tokyo (or Edo as they called it at that time) during roughly the same era as Hakuouki is, the supposedly-famous firework maker Tamaya Seikichi a.k.a. the main male protagonist received a strange request from a strange customer with starry eyes to make a strange firework called ‘rocket’ that can reach the moon. Meanwhile, the young maidens of Edo were terrorized by a strange blood-sucking monster that is rumored to have come from the moon! Is the main protagonist’s strange customer is involved with all those gruesome murders?

This anime is a dialogue-heavy slice-of-life title, although you can also expect plenty of humor and a reasonable amount of action scenes. The quality of the storyline is decent, but the romance elements in this anime is actually found in an unexpected place (read: not involving the main male protagonist). The aforementioned humor in this anime is pretty much generic most of the time, with the exception of some toilet-type humor scenes. While the pacing of this anime is a little bit on the slow side, the storyline is moving along just nicely without any notable hiccups up until episode 20, where a major story arc ends.

Some witty lines there by the best character of this anime.

This is where my major complaint about this anime will come in, which is about the three filler episodes that comes after the end of the major arc mentioned above, and before the ending arc started. No matter how I looked at those three episodes, they doesn’t explain anything useful to the storyline prior to that point, or contribute anything new that the ending arc can use. This is similar to the filler episodes that you can see in Ergo Proxy, but with worse results. And of course, just like the vast majority of filler episodes out there in any given Japanese anime, the filler episodes in here doesn’t contribute to character developments either. The director should have re-appropriated the three filler episodes and replaced it with a simple time-jump plot device. That way, the continuation of the storyline would not have been interrupted and the ending arc should have come immediately after the episode 20 finished playing.

To Mr. Director, if you get rid of the 3 filler episodes, maybe then you can close many of the plot-holes left in this anime after the end credit finished playing?

The ending arc is pretty much underwhelming, no thanks for the three filler episodes that took out the momentum built up to the end of episode 20. The fact that the ending is full with clichés and very predictable, not to mention somewhat outrageous, doesn’t help either. Apart from the ending, this anime has made quite a lot of references to other TV shows, anime, manga and other printed materials, like Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann and, purposely multiple times, Tenpou Ibun Ayakashi Ayashi. Unlike Hakuouki, this anime is only barely historically accurate, with plenty of unabashed tinge of modernity abound throughout this anime. Those hints of modernity (like mobile phones, Internet, AV products etc) are what makes the storyline went off the railways of true history (not that the Japanese is alien of doing this in real life) but also allows this anime to have some out-of-this-world (literally) plot developments that tests the limits of suspension of disbelief.

The best character in this anime is truly a refined gentleman.

Character development in this anime is uneven, but yet easily the best thing this anime have. While the two main protagonists are just your bog-standard anime characters you can see in similar titles in slice-of-life/shounen genres, the main antagonist of this anime is really someone else. Easily the best character in this anime by a million miles, the main antagonist of this anime is what you called a realistic character, which gone against this anime’s outrageous fabric if you ask me. Comedic but cruel, indecisive yet impulsive, insensitive yet cowardly, this anime is worth watching just to look at him doing his thing throughout this anime. His character development is superb, using the strategy that you usually can only see in a main protagonist of a shounen anime. His growth from a weak coward that only knows how to bully helpless poor residents of Edo to a highly-dogmatic, very skilled swordsman antagonist is spectacular to say the least. His end in the underwhelming ending arc is underwhelming, but kudos at the writers for creating an antagonist like him. The shounen genre would benefit with more characters like him.

Pay your homage to the best character in this anime above!

Character Design:-
The character design in this anime is excellent, and if you ignore the characters that comes from the moon, almost seinen-like. I actually want to complain about the overabundance of hair dyes in this anime, then I remembered that they have the Internet in this anime (yet they doesn’t have ICBMs), therefore I think I should just shut up. Definitely a positive aspect for this anime.

The best character of this anime is not the only problem that our main protagonist has to deal with.

Voice Acting:-
Voice acting in this anime is just average overall. Still, there are some good voice acting gigs in this title that has huge character cast, such as the main male protagonist and the main antagonist.

Music:-
The OST of this anime is excellent, and so are the catchy OP theme. The two ED themes doesn’t fare so well though.

For a slice-of-life anime, the violence in this anime can be so spontaneous and so raw. In other words: IT'S AWESOME!!

Animation/Direction:-
This anime uses the abhorrent blurry animation technique detailed very much in this category of posts, usually in fast-paced scenes that does not involves battles. Surprisingly, the usage of this technique in battle scenes is quite low, but can still be seen as the anime nears its end. Considering that this anime predates Nabari no Ou, the first anime where I observed this phenomena happening, this only shows that this plague that is infesting Japan’s animation industry do have deep roots that spanned years.

One point docked off this anime final evaluation.

Overall, the animation quality in this anime is good, even in fast-paced scenes. Choreography in action scenes is average though. The directing really screwed-up with the filler episodes, but the main antagonist development somewhat balanced things out.

Some of the modern amenities that is suspiciously available during the Bakufu era in Edo.

Conclusion:-
7 out of 10. Bokurano still reigns as the ‘Anime of the Year 2007’ holder, and highly likely, will be for a very long time, just like One Outs is. Only the positions for Chocotto Sister, Zan Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei, and Working!! are less tenable. Currently I’m torn between a 12-episode series and another one with 50-episode series, therefore, if I decided to watch the latter next, the next review will not come for quite some time.

A parody of basically a lot of toku-sentai titles in real-life Japan.