Review: Highschool of the Dead (学園黙示録 HIGHSCHOOL OF THE DEAD)

Posted by ranpha on 10th October 2010
Posted in: anime review. Tagged: , . Leave a Comment


Do you play the Left 4 Dead series? If yes, join me and my like-minded friends above at Left 4 Dead Japan Steam Group as we defend Tokyo eastern United States from the zombie apocalypse! Add me in your friend list via my profile here.

Today, Highschool of the Dead will have the honors of being the first 2010 anime that will challenge the newly anointed ‘Anime of the Year 2010’ title holder Working!! Featuring a storyline that is very common in the Western world in multiple forms of entertainment media, will this anime set up in the suburbs of modern Japan shoots its way to the title?


Of course you silly, silly boy! You are in an anime now! Probably the first ever zombie apocalypse anime ever made.

Story:-
It’s spring in Japan, and the school year has just started. Suddenly, from out of the blue, the ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE arrived! A ragtag bunch consisted of several high-school students (and their anatomically-incorrect school nurse) then has to fight their way out of their zombie-infested school, one safe-room episode at a time as the world slowly descends into a NUCLEAR APOCALYPSE!

Frankly speaking, the storyline in this anime is not much different than your typical Hollywood B-movies that has the same plot. Here you will see the conventional zombies that is sensitive to sound (while forsaking the other 4 senses), has supernatural strength, hard to kill except with a headshot and cannot cross any body of water. Fortunately for our survival team, the zombies here walks slowly plus the infection vector doesn’t spread airborne. If this is Left 4 Dead, which I play quite extensively, this ragtag bunch won’t survive a day with those fast common infected and of course, the special infected.

Oh BTW, those zombies doesn’t walk around moaning ‘Brainnnnnsss’ or whatever its Japanese equivalent.

And just like those B-grade Hollywood flicks, fan service rules the roost. If in those films, you can see scantily-clad women with the tightest of outfits and the least amount of fabric possible, armed with shotgun while cr0wning those undeads, in this anime you can see pretty much the same thing, except that the female characters prefers to melee the undead instead of shooting them. I have to admit, I do really like them hehehehe. The fan-service is definitely one of the most important traits this anime has, which is reinforced by the fact that as the series goes on, the amount of fabrics that the female characters wears become lesser and lesser with every passing hour.

Zombie apocalypse and fan service aside, is the story is any good? Well, I have never seen any of those B-grade Hollywood flicks being nominated for Best Picture in Academy Awards, thus you should not expect any Hayao Miyazaki-quality storyline in this manga-adapted anime. But then again, I highly enjoyed watching this fast-paced action-packed title, assisted by flawless plot progression all the way to the ending that is set up for a richly-deserved movie sequel second season. If a second season is really in the cards, then I suggest that it should be cornily titled ‘Highschool of the Dead II – The Siege of the Shopping Mall’ or something like that hahahaha!

Meanwhile, I feel the character developments in this anime is constrained by the low amount of episodes this anime has. The way the story is written, there should be plenty of development potential left amongst the members of the ragtag bunch, especially the school nurse, the weapon nerd and the newly-orphaned brat. And did I see some good romance subplot forming there? Thinking about them, the more convinced I have become that this anime really need a sequel. A sequel with a corny title!


The Left 4 Dead protagonists may have it harder than the protagonists in this anime, but at least they doesn't have an emo baggage like the one above!

Character Design:-
The character designs for male characters is pretty much your stereotypical shounen cookie-cutter design and just barely passable, but the designs for female characters definitely come straight out from a hentai mini-OVA or something like that. Nevertheless the designers managed to keep the design under control, unlike the over-the-top designs you can see in Dragonaut – the resonance. Definitely a positive aspect for this anime, and I fully expect to see more inappropriate ‘fan-fictions’ surfacing at TokyoTosho in the future.

Voice Acting:-
Voice acting in this anime is solid overall, but there are no outstanding performer(s) that stands out from the rest. A positive aspect for this anime.

Music:-
The OST is sparse and only evident in action scenes, but it is still decent. The OP theme is very good, and so are the most of the ED themes except for episode 8, 12, 11, and 4. A positive aspect for this anime.


Move aside Ceiling Cat/Basement Cat/Long cat or whatever! Here we have the most awesome cat in the world, who sleeps his/her way through a zombie apocalypse as if they are nothing!

Animation/Direction:-
The character animation in this anime is not as fluid as I expected for my standard, but the general animation quality is very good, even in fast-paced scenes. Choreography in this anime is mixed bag; the action scenes by the meleeing female characters are good, while the rest is just average. The director has not done anything wrong at all in this series, and that’s a decent feat onto itself, considering that it is really easy to screw up with this kind of storyline.

Conclusion:-
8 out of 10. Therefore Working!! will be able to keep its title for the time being. I still haven’t made any decision of what anime I should watch next, you just have to wait for it to come.


Some faulty advice about the usage of shoguns for killing zombies there buddy. In Left 4 Dead, unless you are cr0wning, you will aim the shotgun at the chest, not the head. The main protagonist will learn this the hard way though. And do not use them in open space maps, unless you are pretty desperate.

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Review: Soul Eater (ソウルイーター)

Posted by ranpha on 7th October 2010
Posted in: anime review. Tagged: . 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:-

  1. 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?
  2. 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.
  3. 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?

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Review: Giniro no Olynssis (銀色のオリンシス)

Posted by ranpha on 26th September 2010
Posted in: anime review. Tagged: . 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!

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