Otakon 2011

Yes, I know, it's a week later, but I had work pretty much everyday last week.

News, news, news! I asked a great deal of questions when I was at panels for Japanese directors in particular I tried my best to ask good questions. You can actually see one on Anime News Network's coverage of Otakon 2011 in the Madoka panel (http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/convention/2011/otakon/8). Iwakami and those asking questions were great about the fact that we had to go through a translator to get all our questions answered. I was pretty glad to have made Iwakami smile just by mentioning Bakemonogatari, as the show didn't take off quite as much in the States as Madoka has. Essentially I asked him if he used his experience from working on Bakemono to work on Madoka, and he said that they did. He also confessed that the witches' labyrinth was not how it was originally planned, but there was originally a tentacle monster. And we've all seen enough hentai to know what that means.

I also attended the Who Wants to Be a Voice Actor panel, and it was pretty gosh darn fantastic, I was glad to have gotten in! For auditions they essentially picked three people at random, had them read a part (females read the female role, males the male) and they would deliberate. Then one winner was picked for each part and the scene was read. As luck would have it I did get picked and it was for the scene that was filmed. You can watch me make voices you wouldn't expect right here:

For those of you who ever wondered how to cute, cute, that's it. There were a lot of announcements that were made at industry panels, but for those I would take a look at ANN's coverage, since they did a great job.

Panel wise I would say this year was a little disappointing. Out of all those I attended (OC Remix and Voice Actors After Dark included), I would say Akira after dark was the most entertaining. From what I can gather Anime: Myths and Legends was not the same panelist as last year and was very disappointing, which is a shame. It's a little strange that Otakon cut so many Acafan panels, considering last year offered a lot of entertainment. The lines were also a bit frustrating as for the panels I did attend I waited in line for a maximum of an hour. Yes, otaku are professional queuers, but even we have our limits. That's all I have to say about that.

AAO Signing off!

What a lazy blogger I am. I haven’t been keeping up, but I have a good reason. It’s because I’m an even lazier author. I’ve been trying to edit my next book, and after writing for so long I get a little disinterested. I have plenty of ideas to add, including a competition for who’s the better “Japanese Batman,” I just haven’t written them yet. So sorry about that.

As a result of the Great Earthquake Disaster, the spring season started late and ended even later (I believe it just ended last week as I’m writing this). If you remember I dropped several shows and kept track of a few others. The list managed to narrow itself down even more, as Sekai Ichi almost entirely lost my interest. The spring seasons also proved to be surprisingly long as those that I’ve picked have continued on, so no one gets a biseason (more than twelve) episode pass this time as they all ran longer [Deadman Wonderland has not yet been confirmed as having a second season].

DROPPED: Sekai Ichi

But not  fun enough.

The World’s Greatest First Love is what almost every yaoi fangirl wants in the first few episodes and shear fanservice for the rest. Four episodes in, the main coupling is dropped and a second pair is introduced. By the time I reached the eighth episode and we had returned to the original I found myself no longer enamored by the relationships in the show. So as pretty as everything was it just had no rewatch value for me and by the ninth episode I felt no desire to follow it whatsoever. So sadly The World’s Greatest First Love fell into the oven vents this season.

IN THE FREEZER: Nichijou (My Ordinary Life)

Probably one of my favorite skits..."What girl doesn't love butlers?!"

Technically I wouldn’t rank something like Nichijou so low but again it was one of those shows that I ended up watching if I needed something cheerful for before work. Like Azumanga and Lucky Star it has it’s camp factor, but also its supernatural factor. There’s charm in robot matron Nano that is matched only by the professor. Yandere is taken to the extreme in a humorous way via military grade weapons. This is all done to humorous effect and the jokes are very rarely lost albeit they can take a long time to deliver (see the supernatural episode). When the humor finally hits, its on the spot. The animation style also helps to add to the effect, giving a smooth, gentle look. Enjoyable, yes. Rewatchable, certainly. But Nichijou still finds itself at the bottom of a raging hot list.

+Music by hyadain2525 (really, check out his YouTube channel sometime)
+Smooth Animation
+Slice of life humor
-Length to delivery
-Sectioned Episodes
-Jokes don’t always translate well

IN THE OVEN: Hanasaku Iroha

All of them moe!

Iroha was and still is probably the best romance series I’ve seen this season and, quite possibly, all year. Initially I was afraid it might take the yuuri route it had every possibility of doing. Instead it has turned into a sort of unrequited love triangle. All of it is a maturing experience for Ohana and by the time twelve episodes are up she’s become an entirely new person. For what it has aimed to achieve, not an episode has been wasted. Masahiro Ando, as usual, knows what he’s doing.

+Animation Quality
+Voice acting
+Development of characters and relationships
-Ohana angst
-No clear resolution in the future
-Large amount of characters

HEATING UP: Deadman Wonderland

Shiro: Still adorable

Originally, right before I watched the season finale, I gave Deadman Wonderland quite a high score.  Unfortunately, it doen’t quite seem to complete itself or resolve any issues in it’s one season run. The reason it’s still so high is because it was, overall, a pretty good show. The animation quality was great, and though I haven’t read the manga, the plot is certainly one to be desired. It looks more at how people react than at how Ganta does.  If anything there’s a cast of enjoyable characters who all have their own background and their own twists.

+Animation
+Voice Cast
+Mystery
-Unresolved plot
-Music isn’t great
-Breast enhancements

COMING TO A BOIL: Tiger and Bunny

Exactly!

It would not be an understatement if I said I absolutely love Tiger and Bunny, which is a little odd considering I’m the direct opposite of the demographics. Part of this reason is because I enjoy super hero shows so much. They’re just so fantastic in their telling. It was a little mean to call it out on combining mech anime, because in the end it pulled out all the same things you’d expect there to be. The first two episodes did little to explain how NEXT (those with superpowers) work, so I could only presume the heroes had their powers when in their power suits. Au contraire, NEXT are working all the time.  The main focus is not just on Batman like Bunny, but almost every hero gets his or her own back story to the point that you can understand where the whole team is coming from. There are some moral issues that are brought up later in the season [ep 1-12], but they are handled with the same reasoning any good American comic book would. But there’s the difference: it’s not an American comic book, it’s a Japanese anime and it disguises itself all too well.

+Storytelling
+Characters
+In show demographics
-Goofy animation at times
-Batman
-Overall soundtrack

GOURMET MEAL: [C] The Money of Soul and Possibility Control

Actually the Engrish is pretty good...

The winner this season is [C], for its ability to combine shonen with economics.  There are battles, yes, but they are always well composed and rather fast. There are few episodes in which you might consider them to be the focus. Rather, the idea of consequence lies heavily on the protagonist the whole time. There is the idea that he can change the world for the better, and often times does by breaking the unwritten set of rules. He remains clueless about the actual rules up until the end of the series. Money, as we know, is an important part of every society and this series plays up all the what-ifs that could come with it.

+Plot
+Alice in Wonderland
+ Economics made shonen
- Engrish
-Soundtrack
-Loss of ‘future’

I won't be doing on of these for the summer simply because...they burn me out! There also aren't too many things I'm looking forward to in the summer season. My suggestions (what I might dabble in when I need something to watch):
*No. 6
*Usagi Drop
*Mawaru-Penguindrum
*Ikoku Meiro no Croise
*Kami-sama no Memo-cho

For those who want something completely weird (Panty and Stocking plot weird) check out Many Hiken-cho. It's an alternate Edo period. Where breast size equates power. No kidding.

Things to look forward to (I mean it this time!):
Wrap-up of Princess Tutu
Japanese Batman: Who deserves the title more?
More transposed lyrics

God Song Transliteration

There's actually a lot of word play in this song, which you can't really translate. Even the title is a little funny as 神曲 can be read as both "God Song" and "Divine Comedy." One of the big things the OnyuuP did was to play on the word "kami" which can mean god, divine, paper, or even hair. Using the rather rough translation of YouTuber ikuy398, I came up with what follows. Also 夢 (yume) shows up a couple times in talking about the universe, but it can also mean dream.

They say it’s a song for god, or a divine video game
Flooding the streets right now, it’s a god bargain sale just for you!

The contents aren't that great, actually thin like pieces of paper,
However I’m saved by these things and so it doesn’t really matter

It was music, it was a song,
a great picture, or a big dream
It's just all a part of the frothy universe
I’m saved by these things I believe in

They say it’s a divine show, a TV program just for god
Flooding the world and the airwaves are gods at giveaway prices

They might be rather thin, fluttering down like windblown hair
However I’m saved by these sort of things, so it isn’t something that matters!

They were gardens, they were deserts
It was the cool air, or a water surface
It's all a ordinary part of the universe
I’m saved by these normal things I notice

I could never possibly become a hero like those in the myths
I could never possibly truly be someone that is omnipotent

I don’t want to be God, it’s good that I wish to be
So that I would be able to save someone someday

And that’s why….and that’s why

You were there for me, I was there for you
You call them buddy’s, I call them my friends
All we futile people wish to do is
To be saved and to save one another

We compose music, we all sing songs
Draw a picture, and carry big dreams
They’re all part of the tiny universe
Today as usual somebody came and saved us 

Hello (How Are You) Transliteration

Hello/How Are You?

Hello
Opening my window, I quietly whispered it
How are you?
All alone, I sit here in my room
Morning
The sun’s risen, but it’s hidden by pouring rain
Tick-tock
Like a clockwork doll come and wind up my spring

Hello
It happened just like this in an old anime
How are you?
Jealousy  at seeing everyone so loved
Sleeping
I really have to stop stupidity and start preparing
Crying
In order to hide the marks from my tears
Now…

What I like to say is “fine, whatever”
Calling suddenly to my mind those  words from yesterday
“No hope is left for you in my mind anymore…”
To be perfectly honest with myself
I don’t have any hope left for me either
Even so why would you say something like that?

All of the words that are moving to my throat
Come out my mouth as blatant lies
So today I must have wasted some valuable words
But I will still keep on living my life

Why is it that you keep on hiding it?
Being laughed at isn’t scary right?
Do you really not want to see anyone at all?
Is all that the truth?
Ambiguity is a sea I’m drowning in,
It hurts too much to even take a breath
Small urges to hear someone speak appear
I really am so weak…

Amid all these preparation to go nowhere
My head starts running many ideas
“Should we find a reason to take a break and rest now?”
No,no, I can understand it
Now I’m just saying whatever I could to you
Resting isn’t something I can do, so don’t get mad at me

Being happy or being sad are two things uncertain
Unbiased and cruelly the sun still rises
With all my might I continue to live on in this life
What else could I possibly wish for?

Why is there any need to worry over it?
I’m asking if you really want to listen to me?
I want to know who was it that took their hand away,
Did you notice?
If existence came with a time card,
When could I finally time out?
And all the pay that comes for my hours alive,
I wonder who would pay them.

Thank you
I just want to say thank you
Thank you
I really just want to say thank you
Thank you
Even one time would be fine
And so from the bottom of my weeping heart
I just want to say thank you!

Why is that you keep on hiding it?
I’m asking if you really want to listen to me?
Not once have you smiled or wept,
Can we talk about that?

If you never say the words that you really feel,
I’ll never know what you’re thinking about.
It can’t be helped that we’re so troublesome
I’m just being human!

Hello How are you?
Hello How are you?
Hello How are you?
I just want to ask, hello, how are you?

There’s  a great deal of material to cover with Princess Tutu, especially since it spans two seasons. Two, very well developed seasons. This means that the plot for both Chapter of the Egg and Chapter of the Fledgling will need to be covered separately plot wise. I won't be delving too much into the characters, but looking at it more from a broad perspective. Every character makes their own contributions and growth, so I feel it's important to cover them seperately.

PLOT

Chapter of the Egg

As the first installment of the Tutu plotline, Chapter of the Egg starts off like almost every transforming girl story: girl granted power, girl transforms for some great cause, girl saves boy she’s in love with. Even with these basic plot pieces intact, though, it still manages to bring a great bit more to the table. There are several key points in this arc that are dropped later on, or at least become largely ignored.

In the first chapter we see a girl fall in love with a boy, or rather, a duck fall in love with a prince. This is a new take on an old favorite, but definitely brings to mind the story of swan Lake almost immediately. In that story the prince goes hunting in the woods and almost shoots the princess who has been turned into a swan. In Tutu we instead of a lonely duck watching an even lonelier prince and immediately asks the question why. It is thanks to this curiosity that she is rewarded with humanity, something that comes only because a plot device is needed. In this case I am not using plot device in a mean way. Duck is for all intents and purposes a plot device written in by Drosselmyer.

Chapter of the Fledgling

This chapter is where the metaphorical s41t hits the fan. This is also where Princess Tutu proves itself as being much more than the standard mahout shoujo anime. While Duck certainly continues to fulfill her heroes quest, it is the emergence of the true villain, or rather what appears to be the true villain through Princess Kraehe. The incorporation of a singular evil focus means that the grounds are laid for an at times convoluted plot. I will discuss how this affects specific characters in the section on characters.

This chapter suffers some of the same problems the first did in the way several things are arranged for plot convenience. While Drosselmyer does act as a convenient tool to sneak in plot occurrences, which becomes especially apparent when the move to stop his control over the town begins, they are still occurrence I would call necessary. Of course to counter this Fakir also undergoes some changes through personality and is given the same sort of abilities to control the world around him as Drosselmyer. As can be expected there is quite a bit of a tension leading to the finale, which concludes the story for both Mytho and Fakir. However, Duck’s side of the story is only resolved in the sense that she achieves her goal of restoring Mytho’s heart and comes into herself.

Happy Mother's Day!

I hope everyone is having a happy Mother's Day here in the States! My mom and I have a sort of big sister-little sister relationship, so we get along alright. Something funny to note is that she doesn't like anime at all unless it's a film, so I figured I'd try and find something she might like, which is difficult to do. Either way, she is usually willing to check it out if it isn't super ridiculous or silly. I might just set the family down and watch some Cowboy Bebop one day. In the meantime, see you space cowboys!

Kiki and her mother from Kiki's Delivery Service, my favorite Miyazaki movie!

Spring Season I Part II

How is your spring going so far? Are you trapped in a never ending downpour like I am? I hope not, I really hope not…Moving along, out of the five other series I had to review, only one has managed to survive. I did add in one more show, simply because I completely forgot about it and how much I was looking forward to it. So we’ll save that as a surprise at the end. There was a certain amount of fanservice in each of them, which was a little annoying all in all. Perhaps the most frequent theme is the harem this season, or maybe even just how many perverted things they can get away with. So let’s see the mess that is the second half of the Spring Season Part I. With so many being dropped I may pick up some of the later premiering shows. This time in reverse order of worst to best!

A Bridge to the Starry Sky
Here is the obvious harem anime of the season. I was originally looking forward to it, just from the animation, but other than that there is nothing I particularly enjoyed about the show. It was the standard boy enters a town where his only classmates are apparently female…and fervently in love with his adowable little brother. This seems like Takenori Mihara’s first big job as he only appears to have been episode directors, but it’s a shame it had to be a harem anime. Animation director Koichi Monma seems a bit more prepared, having just gotten off of Madoka’s background animation. So while harem anime can be good, I’m not willing to sit around and see where this goes. A Bridge to the Starry Sky is now streaming on Crunchyroll.
+ Animation
+ Opening
+ Cute little brother
- Obvious plot
- Obvious ending
- HUGE Harem

Hen Zemi

I DON'T KNOW!

Also known as Abnormal Physiology Seminar, this is about as close as you can get to hentai without actually entering it. And yet it’s still comedic simply for the unexpected perversion that seems to happen everywhere, especially coming from director Takao Kato. While he did previously direct To Love-Ru this is an entirely different can of worms. I can’t complain about animation, however, as it is overall good, despite having three animation directors. To give it an accurate chance without jumping in with nothing to go on I did watch the OAV’s as well. As the show has no overarching plot and works mainly on the episode by episode basis there is no real reason for me to have done so, which is of course something I did not know at the time. Simply because I do not think I could take this kind of humor when other outlets are available (especially in the United States), Hen Zemi is being dropped as well.
+ Humor
+ Pop culture references
+ Animation
- Nipple conversations
- Awkward teacher
- Obvious Metaphors

Astarotte’s Toy
A succubus who is afraid of men, has to live by sucking the “life seed” out of men: That’s our basic plot for this show. And it ends up being really cute in a weird, fanservice kind of way. The show is not quite a reverse harem, but there is only one or two males, the main one being employed to go along with Astarotte. He seems to be only interested in her, which is why I don’t entirely consider it a harem anime. The animation itself is fairly crisp and adds to the playfulness of the show. It is reminiscent of Okamisan, and as the Chief Animation Director, Mai Otsuka, worked on that show it is to be expected. It is a little odd that Fumitoshi Oizaki should be the director for the show, but it also makes sense in the playful nature of the show which is almost similar to the sort of naiveté of Disgaea. Despite its enjoyable nature, I do not think I will find anything here I can find elsewhere, which is much the same problem A Bridge to the Starry Sky had, and so it is being dropped. Astarotte’s Toy is now streaming on Crunchyroll.
+ Cute
+ Clean animation
+ Disgaea-esque plot
- Harem?
- Overly silly
- Only one guy

Moe sensors activate!

Nichijou
As soon as I started watching this show I immediately thought of Azumanga Dai-Oh and with good reason. It is very much your slice of life high school comedy. Of course it does have it’s twists, but that’s what makes it so humorous. The animation style is light again, much like what we saw in Wandering Son but not quite as exaggerated. Director Tatsuya Ishihara previously worked on both The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya and Lucky Star and manages to pull off the same sort of humor seen in Lucky Star. There are multiple animation directors on this show as well, all of them doing a great job for each episode. Music wise the same sort of comedic effect from Lucky Star seems to be present, while still keeping the same sort of background sound one might expect in real life. As Yuuji Nomi formerly worked on Ghibli films and Bokurano this is no big surprise. Nichijou is now streaming on Crunchyroll.
+ Clockwork Robot
+ Highschool slice of life
+ Animation
- No plot
- Boogers
- Characters do not converge

I love anpan too, Shiro!

Deadman Wonderland
Almost as soon as I read the premise for this show I was hooked, and more than eager to get started in on it. I was looking forward to a Battle Royale style show set in a prison, and what I got was something far better. Director Koichi Hatsumi is doing a brilliant job of directing this series, just as he did with Lupin III and The Big O. There is the same sort of action mystery that chases the protagonist around and around, and art director Michie Watanabe is doing a great job at keeping everything smooth and crisp, just as she did with the backgrounds of Wolf’s Rain. If you’re looking for a decent shonen series that is not all guns and swords, then I highly recommend Deadman Wonderland. Deadman Wonderland is now streaming on Crunchyroll.
+ Shiro
+ Battle Royale
+ Animation
- Random plot device
- Evil villain
- Improbably cup size

C: The Money of Soul and Possibility of Control

Best. Mad Hatter. Ever.

The same people who worked on Fractale shine through brilliantly yet again with this thriller of a show. Thing Alice in Wonderland meets Wallstreet and there you have it. The show cleverly disguises economic lessons through the use of battles with “assets” and establishes a main goal fairly early on. And as of approximately five seconds ago (as of writing this), Funimation has picked it up for streaming on Hulu. How exciting is that (pretty exciting considering I’m on a caffeine kick now). The first two episodes essentially establish the plot and introduce to us the main characters in an exciting way most series do not. Thus far, C is the best anime of the season. C- Control is now streaming on Hulu.
+ Animation
+ Plot
+ Alice in Wonderland
- Soundtrack
- Batmobile
- Loss of future

So let’s take a look at the rankings so far [x=dropped]:
-C – Control
-Deadman Wonderland
-Hanasaku Iroha
-Tiger and Bunny
-Nichijou
-Sekai Ichi
x Astarotte’s Toy
x Hen Zemi
x Bridge to the Starry Skies
x We, Without Wings

I’m not planning on having a midseason review, as I still have to finish up the Princess Tutu input and review. However, know that those that are left are going to have to fight to the end to see who comes out on top (except maybe Sekai Ichi, which is really just a guilty pleasure). Also, exciting news! Pikko is holding a give away for a Zojirushi Umami Micom Rice Cooker which makes super tasty rice. You can find details on it here ---à http://www.aibento.net/2011/04/28/review-zojirushi-umami-rice-cooker-review-part-3-giveaway/#comment-29968

That’s all for now!