Image by Agasang

Sorry for the lack of updates lately, but I just haven’t been very motivated to write lately. Anyway, I actually hate Maria but couldn’t resist using that line for the title since it was from one of Umineko’s more memorable scenes. Halloween itself doesn’t have the same luster it used to when I was young, but it’s still a fun holiday in and of itself. My days of going house-to-house for free candy are gone, but the consolation is cheap bags of candy (and cavities!) the day after, so it’s not a bad trade off. At any rate It beats prowling the streets at night, getting the proverbial candy crap shoot. When will people learn that NO ONE likes the vile, nasty poison that is candy corn? That stuff is nastier than a sweaty otaku’s armpit in summer.

Anyway, I’m going to stay in and watch animu and stuff. If you have plans for today, be safe since people can go a bit crazy. Also, don’t follow any strange witches home. You might find yourself stuffed with candy… And not in the good way. Or maybe it is the good way if that’s what you want — I’m not one to judge.

PS: This goes against everything I stand for but… ううううううー！

Put ya Nekomimi Modo on!

Two episode impression

When the words ‘cat’ and ‘anime’ usually cross paths, the result is more often than not a cat girl of some sort. I’m the odd man out when I say they’ve always weirded me out, even before furry awareness hit our stream of consciousness. Ugh… Creepy… Disgusting… Cat girls. At any rate, anime do feature cats in some way or another with regularity, but very few have actually put them in a starring role. There’s Chi’s Sweet Home and Nyan Koi… And that’s it. Before I get distracted even more, let’s move on to the Nyan Koi impressions.

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This isn’t the real title screen, but this one is more interesting.

Two episode impression

I’ve been craving a good reference-laden comedy for a while. Hayate S2 and Zan Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei are still fresh in my memory, but neither really satisfied the craving. Hayate S2 had small flashes of reference-comedy but was otherwise a shadow of the first season with regards to referential humor. Zetsubou Sensei has been slipping since the second season and just doesn’t have the same impact it used to. Seitokai no Ichizon (The Student Council’s Judgment) bills itself as a reference-comedy series, but is it a contender or a pretender?

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Kobato, Dobato, Kobato, Dobato.

Two episode impression

I’ve never liked anything CLAMP, and it doesn’t look like Kobato is going to change that opinion.

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Mamiko Noto plays a shy, submissive girl? What a twist.

Two episode impression

School-life romance shoujo aren’t my thing. I don’t know what compelled me to pick up Kimi ni Todoke, seeing as it falls precisely into that genre, but I’m glad I did because this is a bloody brilliant show. Wow, just wow.

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Come for the boob armor, stay for the Mugi Elf.

Two episode impression

Umm, I wanted to write something about Seiken no Blacksmith (The Sacred Blacksmith), but Cecily’s boob armor distracted me and made me lose my train of thought. Boob armor. Boob armor. Boob armor…

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I’m more of a Gouf man, but a Kampfer is fine too.

Two episode impression

Oh Japan, you’re so silly with your various fascinations and strange fetishes, though the blatant obsession with all things German still mystifies me. I’m convinced everyone in Japan is a closet Germanophile at heart. In their defense, Germany is a pretty cool country though. Any country that can give us apple strudel and the most dangerous racetrack known to man gets a thumbs up in my book. This brings us to Kampfer, one of the latest anime to throw around German words like no one’s business without having anything else remotely German in it.

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Railgun go boom.

Two Episode Impression

So… Toaru Kagaku no Railgun is a spin-off of Toaru Majutsu no Index focusing on the less interesting members of the cast er… The scientific side of Academy City. As much as I loved Biribiri-chan in Index, an entire spin-off revolving around her and the super annoying Kuroko is suspect. Index itself was a snooze fest at times, which doesn’t bode well for the spin-off. I want to like it. There’s plenty of silliness, shoujo-ai elements and Large Hadron Collider Tsundere Rail Gun action, but the show’s been fairly blah in the first two episodes. Newcomers Saten and Uihara don’t help matters much as they don’t have much personality so far either.

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The show wasn’t great, but at least it did the sunset ending correctly. I’m looking at you, Phantom.

What should I say about Valkyria Chronicles? For starters, it was a disappointment. The word ‘disappointment’ is usually synonymous with bad, but I don’t mean it in that sense. It’s just that it didn’t live up to the excellent source material. The game was about high-octane action with no shortage of thrilling battles, with the Welkin-Alicia romance acting as a sub-plot. The anime was more focused on the Welkin-Alicia romance (with Faldio along for the ride), with the war acting more as a sub-plot. Definitely not as expected. The anime itself wasn’t bad, really, though it wasn’t great either. Game-to-anime adaptations tend to suck, and in that regard VC was actually above par compared to its brethren.

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Bad end is bad. Questions?

Phantom was a great, polished show with plenty to like about it. The characters had “real” personalities, and their struggles were identifiable. The entire cast was excellently written and convincingly voiced. The animation was very well done, surprising because Bee-Train had been on a downward spiral since El Cazador back in 07. I would actually argue they had started sucking since .hack//Roots a year earlier, but I digress… The music was absolutely phenomenal, and ranks as one of the BEST OSTs in recent memory. All in all it was a great package from start to finish… Save for the outstandingly bad ending. Now before we get to the ending, I feel it’s necessary to touch on the characters and story a bit. Spoilers abound, but then again you shouldn’t be reading this anyway if you didn’t finish the show.

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