[Editorials]

Valentine’s Day post: zoom lens love vs. wide angle romance

Posted by Martin  [Tags: ABC, Kare Kano, Makoto Shinkai, Random thoughts, Saikano, True Tears]

The mission, should I choose to accept it: write a Valentines Day post without taking the Holden Caulfield-esque stance that I take towards most things IRL. I didn’t want to limit myself to a True Tears follow-up post so tried to make a list of romance anime I’m familiar enough with to write about; this didn’t get very far either. It did throw up an observation that I found interesting though: my limited experience of romance anime seems to show two main approaches which, in keeping with the anime blogging tradition of inventing new descriptive terms, I’ve decided to call zoom lens and wide-angle lens storytelling. Yeah, I know categorising things can lead to all sorts of misunderstandings but I had to call them something.

Cutest. Couple. Ever.

[6 Comments]

[Anime Reviews]

2007 in 12 day 12, the end: Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann

Posted by Martin  [Tags: ABC, Gainax, Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann, Twelve days of Christmas]

And so, with the final day of our Twelve Days of Christmas countdown, I’ve worked my way through a metric tonne of turkey, numerous glasses of assorted alcoholic beverages and a countless number of mince pies to give you guys the last Highlight of 2007. Some will cite Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann as a classic in the making for the mecha action; some will have appreciated Yoko’s fanservice x girl with gun combo but for me the series is purest win for re-affirming my faith in Gainax. After some pretty mediocre efforts I can’t stress enough the importance of seeing them getting back to what they do best, and doing it well. *Glaringly obvious spoiler within*

I’d salute that

[4 Comments]

[Anime Reviews]

2007 in 12 day 11: Sayonara Zetsubou-sensei

Posted by Martin  [Tags: ABC, Sayonara Zetsubou-sensei, Twelve days of Christmas]

Comedy is somewhat under-represented on this blog (an issue I’ll be addressing in another forthcoming editorial) but one series that did tickle me every time was the offbeat, dry and often pretty dark Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei. Chalk-and-cheese pairings have been a comedy staple since time immemorial but when the classic gag styles and plot devices are applied to the anime high school comedy the results are surprising…and brilliant.

Relax, you have a second season

[4 Comments]

[Anime Reviews]

2007 in 12 day 10: Moyashimon

Posted by Martin  [Tags: ABC, Moyashimon, Twelve days of Christmas]

I have a soft spot for student-based comedy drama, not to mention a vested interest in all things scientific. The whimsical win that is Moyashimon is right up my street in pretty much every respect; taking the bizarre premise of a guy who can see microbes without the aid of microscopes or magnifying glasses, it follows the progress of the strangely gifted Sawaki and his fellow students through agricultural college. Think of it as a rustic Honey and Clover, with added yeast.

[4 Comments]

[Anime Reviews]

2007 in 12 day 9: Lucky Star

Posted by Martin  [Tags: ABC, Lucky Star, Twelve days of Christmas]

One show that earned a fervent following in the blogosphere was Lucky Star, the one show that I’ll forever remember as The One That I Was Surprised To Enjoy. By rights I should have hated it but for a number of reasons (which I’ve outlined not once but twice and concerning a matter I’ll examine in more detail later) it turned out to be funnier, more moving and generally miles more entertaining than I ever expected it to be.

Aw hell, don’t start THAT again!

Because I’ve already reviewed the show as thoroughly as I ever intend to, all that’s left is to pick a Memorable Moment…the problem is, because the series portrays a lot of stuff happening and nothing happening at the same time, that’s well-nigh impossible. Instead, I’ll pick out my favourite bits featuring the four leads and invite the rest of you to share your own; reminiscing about fun times is after all one of the best things about the festive season! And no, I haven’t deliberately left the supporting cast out. I don’t want you to experience a tl;dr moment so the borderline shoujo-ai overtones of the Yutaka/Minami relationship, Hiyori’s obsession with including friends in her doujinshi, Yui’s Initial D-standard 1337 driving skills or the mayhem fourth wall wrecking of the Lucky Channel won’t make much of an appearance here, for shame.

[7 Comments]

[OAVs, Movies and Full Series]

Kemonozume (2007 in 12 day 8)

Posted by Martin  [Tags: ABC, arthouse, Twelve days of Christmas]

Another title that’s strictly speaking not actually from this year, I only recently watched Kemonozume. Besides, it’s a bit of a sleeper title anyway so deserves a bit of extra attention. As with the products of Studio 4°C, it is relatively little-known and its art style is probably the biggest hinderance in its popularity; this just makes it all the more refreshing and deserving of my raving about it though.

Love conquers all

The story kicks off with two guys in a bar talking about their taste in women…nothing unusual about that, you might think. The thing is, these guys are shokujinki, creatures that can transform into hideous monsters with a taste for human flesh like vampires who have a thirst for blood. Toshihiko is a member of the Kifuuken, an organisation with a long and illustrious history of hunting Shokujinki; he’s a man who is trained to kill such monsters, to the exclusion of all else. Unfortunately, things are about to go wrong for them all after he falls for the demure Yuka, a woman with a gruesome secret…

[5 Comments]

[Anime Reviews]

2007 in 12 day 7: Kaiji

Posted by Martin  [Tags: ABC, Kaiji, Twelve days of Christmas]

Gambling, mullets and manly tears…zawa zawa!

The first latecomer to this list is Kaiji, the black sheep of the autumn season. In a slew of new shows that seemed to be dominated by otaku-centric fantasy rom-coms set in schools, Kaiji bucked the trend with its ‘gar’ approach and no-nonsense storytelling. Firstly, it wasn’t a romance, a comedy or anything supernatural; as a matter of fact, at the time of writing it doesn’t feature any female characters at all. Given the unflattering character designs that make almost everyone look like rejects from the Gorillaz, maybe it’s best being all-male anyway…

The hero is introduced as a petty criminal and jobless bum who offers little cause for us to like him or even give a damn about where he ends up; he’s down on his luck but is otherwise a low-life who deserves pity perhaps but definitely not respect. When he gets the opportunity to erase his debts in a Yakuza-run casino aboard the good ship Espoir (lol@irony), Kaiji becomes a shrewd and irrepressible gambling force to be reckoned with who is determined to turn his life around. Huerrgh!

[4 Comments]

[Anime Reviews]

2007 in 12 day 6: The Girl Who Leapt Through Time

Posted by Martin  [Tags: ABC, Twelve days of Christmas]

My shiny new RSS feed is working like a charm now (complete with added FEEDBURN), so subscribe, browse and enjoy. ^_^ Sadly my fansub reviewing is soon to grind to a frustrating and indefinite halt and I can’t work out exactly why. Halp plz. Back on-topic…

It wasn’t long ago that I was watching and reviewing this movie for the first time but, being a highlight of the year and being next up alphabetically, I’m revisiting it again in the name of the festive season. Actually, since Bandai have picked up the licence less than a fortnight ago, it is actually quite topical anyway. All I can say on the latter point is, good job Bandai. And for the rest of you…go grab it as soon as the DVD’s out and, in the case of stateside fans, catch it on the big screen too.

I’ve gone over why this movie is such a highpoint of the last twelve months (I know it came out last year but I only watched it recently…) in my review so I guess I ought to pick out the best bits of the film. It’s therefore going to be a shorter one so there’ll be none of that tl;dr nonsense, ok?

[4 Comments]

[Anime Reviews]

2007 in 12 day 5: ef -a tale of memories

Posted by Martin  [Tags: ABC, ef -a Tale of Memories, Twelve days of Christmas]

This post is a bit shorter than I hoped, maily because I’ve been preoccupied with getting my RSS link to redirect to my new Feedburner feed (no luck so far, which hacks me off no end) and trying to work out why Bit Tornado isn’t working any more (the status light is green but no downloading or uploading is taking place…no luck on that either). Apologies for my feed url redirect not working, because I’m all out of ideas on that front; unless something miraculous happens I’ll also exhaust my backlog and run out of new stuff to write about, period. In addition, my server died for several minutes during the writing of this post so the last couple of paragraphs were typed from memory (pun intended). It’s not shaping up to be a good week.

So, ef -a tale of memories. What’s to say that I haven’t said already? It’s possibly the oddest title of the season, in that its subject matter is pretty common in shows these days (hell, it’s even one of those that’s based off one of those bishoujo games, for crying out loud) while its execution is very unusual indeed. Whether or not it would feel as generic as similarly themed fare without SHAFT’s innovative presentation I don’t know, but the fact remains that the striking visual effects convey the story’s themes and ideas in a refreshingly new way. Love it or hate it, ef IS different; I’d respect it’s creators’ efforts purely on that alone. There’s still a lot to say in terms of its progress at this point though.

[3 Comments]

[OAVs, Movies and Full Series]

Dennou Coil full series (2007 in 12, day 4)

Posted by Martin  [Tags: ABC, Dennou Coil, Twelve days of Christmas]

On Friday afternoon I watched the last two episodes of Dennou Coil and wanted to somehow commit my thoughts to words, and without interrupting the twelve day countdown into the bargain. So, here it is: Day 4 of my Twelve Best Bits of 2007. Since we’re well into the autumn season I think I can say with certainty now that DC is, as far as I’m concerned, the TV series of the year. I’ll try to pick out another few Memorable Moment candidates after the moar tag that’s a bit more specific than “the whole damn thing!” too.

[7 Comments]