Manga and Anime

[Seareach]

My Neighbor Totoro

My son and I love Totoro!

[Dan, this post is for you! oxoxoxoxox ]

[Worm of Despite]

Just finished Love Hina. Very funny, slightly perverted but tasteful manga. It's an old trope: a dork gets put in charge of an all-female dormitory.

But Hina focuses on its characters, rather than the fantastical harem aspect; we witness the main character's growth--and learn a few things ourselves (such as finding change in life when everything looks hopeless). Keitaro's refusal to give up was also pretty inspiring, as I struggled through school a few years back.

[[Syl]]

I've been watching Zombie Loan this summer. It's pretty good. Nothing really exciting or innovative, but entertaining. I'd put it at about the same level as InuYasha. I really dig both the opening and closing theme music.

[CovenantJr]

I've recently joined my new university's anime society, which means I'm seeing some stuff that's new to me. We basically have about four or five series that we watch at a rate of one episode per series, per week. Here are the series we've started watching, and some that we randomly sampled at a taster session:

Higurashi - The first episode annoyed the hell out of me because it appeared to be a very twee high school soap, with stupid (and very Japanese) humour thrown in (sometimes Japanese humour can be funny, sometumes...not). The second episode reveals it to be a sinister thriller/drama masquerading as cute fluff. Strange.

Negima - This is apparently a remake of an earlier series that was criticised for being too 'pervy'. This one is less pervy (though still a little) and is surprisingly amusing. Ten year old boy wizard is sent to teach at an all-girl boarding school. Better than it sounds, but with gaping plot holes by the end of the second episode.

School Rumble - Kind of a love triangle thing in a high school. Sounds really dull and irritating in theory, but is a riot of laughs in practice.

Trinity Blood - This was described to me as "Trigun with vampires" and that's not far wrong. Science fiction gothic horror, with a Vatican-based Catholic priest who appears to be Vash the Stampede.

Bakumatsu - Confusing samurai series. Apparently each plot arc is resolved in two or three episodes, so hopefully it'll become less confusing soon.

Hayate the Combat Butler - Bizarre (though less bizarre than Excel Saga) and very funny. I can't really describe it.

Snow Queen - Dull retelling of a Scandinavian fairy tale. Possibly a good story, but moves at the speed of continental drift and is infuriatingly twee (though not very anime-like in art or style, to be fair to it). I'd suggest avoiding it.


At home, I've been watching:

Yugo the Negotiator - A nice change of pace and style for anime. Thoughtful and dialogue-based, though the first series is by far the weaker of the two I've seen.

RahXephon - This is a re-watch. I'm enjoying it even more the second time round. Highly recommended for anyone who likes intelligence in their anime, whether or not giant robots appeal.

[CovenantJr]

After hearing nothing but good about it from several people, I started watching Rozen Maiden a couple of days ago. I'm a mere three episodes in, but it doesn't grab me at all. Partly it's because the series seems confused as to what it's trying to be - I've seen it reviewed as "gothic horror", but so far it's more like a soap. My biggest problem with the series at this point, though, is the characters. There isn't a single character I don't want to punch. The main character, Jun, is a self-absorbed, tyrannical teenager who makes everyone's life a misery for no apparent reason - and he's the most likeable character in this thing. At first I applauded Shinku for slapping some sense into him, but she soon turned out to be more domineering and demanding than he is, with the added 'benefit' of being disdainful and condescending. By the time Suiseiseki appeared, I found myself grinding my teeth and mentally yelling at Jun, not for being a git, but for somehow (inexplicably) refusing to batter every one of these obnoxious dolls against the nearest wall until they stop moving.

In view of my growing irritation with this series, I decided to take a break from it and watch the much-lauded Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind. It annoyed me less than Rozen Maiden, but it was almost not worth bothering with. It's a very pretty film, particularly in light of its age, but nice visuals alone do very little. I found it almost completely unengaging, and from the half-hour point onwards, I was counting down the minutes until it finished. It wasn't terrible, just...flat. Pretty, but empty. And it's not the relative lack of action (though there are several action scenes, they're less prevalent than in some other titles) - after all, I greatly enjoyed Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter...and Spring, in which almost nothing happens for the entire duration. No, a lack of action is no obstacle - but Spring was engrossing and atmospheric, with engaging characters, while Nausicaa was just...nothing.

[Reisheiruhime]

NARUTO. This is all I have to say.

*drools pathetically over her Naruto Trading Cards, in particular the Orochimaru ones* If only... If only you were real.....

(Yes. The great TF has a crush on an anime character. And she's gone insane over it. We're all doomed.)

[CovenantJr]

You and your bloody Orochimaru obsession.

It's aaaaaall about Hunter X Hunter for me. Gon = actually likeable; Killua = natural badass; Leorio = genuinely amusing; Kurapica = most unexpected but justified badass to date; Hisoka = creepy and unpleasant.

Great stuff.

[The Laughing Man]

I've been catching Deathnote on Adult Swim lately, and I hate it so much I can't stop watching it!

[CovenantJr]

Heh, loads of people reckon Death Note is really good. I've been meaning to try it.

[The Laughing Man]

it's a minor one, but:

Spoiler

well, a shinigami (deathgod) who has to beg for apples which he can just go steal or pick off a tree doesn't help, heh. stuff like that, etc.

[Moxinomal]

Having read the entirety of the Death Note manga, I definetly recommend it.

[CovenantJr]

Today I watched the first episode of Serial Experiments Lain. I'd heard it was strange, but...it's really strange. When I say 'strange', I don't mean zany like (deep breath) Quack Experimental Anime Excel Saga, I mean bizarre like, say, Mulholland Drive.

Maybe the second episode will clarify things a little. Probably not though. Still, I have faith that everything will make sense in the end; after all, RahXephon was utterly baffling to start with, and that whole mess finally fell into place after a mere two viewings of all 26 episodes...

[emotional leper]

Lain was a trip. I remember watching that back in the day. If you like it, and you haven't seen them, you may be interested in Neon Genesis Evangelion and Fooly Cooly.

[CovenantJr]

I've seen the first four or so episodes of Evangelion, but never got round to watching more. I hear there's a lot more quasi-philosophy stuff to it than is apparent in the early episodes, but at the time it just seemed like standard saturday morning cartoon stuff. I do plan to finish it at some point, but it's not a priority.

As for Fooly Cooly... From the little I know, it scares me. Plus I don't know if I could take it seriously when it's apparently meant to be Furi Kuri or, to Anglicise its pronunciation, Furry Curry. It's enough to put me off my dinner (which was indeed curry, but mercifully not very furry).

[emotional leper]

I've seen the first four or so episodes of Evangelion, but never got round to watching more. I hear there's a lot more quasi-philosophy stuff to it than is apparent in the early episodes, but at the time it just seemed like standard saturday morning cartoon stuff. I do plan to finish it at some point, but it's not a priority.

As for Fooly Cooly... From the little I know, it scares me. Plus I don't know if I could take it seriously when it's apparently meant to be Furi Kuri or, to Anglicise its pronunciation, Furry Curry. It's enough to put me off my dinner (which was indeed curry, but mercifully not very furry).

The name is actually Fooly Cooly, atleast according to the OSTs.

As to the name, the show loves puns.

[CovenantJr]

Hmm, the reviews I've read have tended to favour Furi Kuri, but that could just be po-faced anime zealots being pretentious.

Anyway, no, I haven't seen it. But I may yet... Currently, the main one I want to get my hands on is Murder Princess.

[emotional leper]

Hmm, the reviews I've read have tended to favour Furi Kuri, but that could just be po-faced anime zealots being pretentious.

I learned that a good way to decided whether to listen to anything that comes out of an anime fan's mouth is if they call themself an otaku. If they do, I ignore them. On the subject of Fooly Cooly, I've gotten into a lot of stupid arguments with otaku about the word-puns and word-play in that show. They usually devolve into me smacking someone for saying 'desu' too much.

Anyway, no, I haven't seen it. But I may yet... Currently, the main one I want to get my hands on is Murder Princess.

I've not seen that. I'll see if I can dig up a copy. PS -- If you ever get around to Toronto, there is a very large Asian Mall there where you can get extremely cheap HKs of practically any anime you want.

[CovenantJr]

If you ever get around to Toronto, there is a very large Asian Mall there where you can get extremely cheap HKs of practically any anime you want.

I'm there! *buys ticket, packs underwear*

They usually devolve into me smacking someone for saying 'desu' too much.

ARGH! I hate the 'desu' thing! I've seen at least two anime series where some character or other says 'desu' at the end of every sentence for no apparent reason. Makes me want to punch people. Damn you, Negima! Actually, Negima has multiple offenders, in that there's also someone who says 'de gozaru' all the time. I think that's basically the same as 'desu', but marginally less annoying.

[I'm Murrin]

Hmm, the reviews I've read have tended to favour Furi Kuri, but that could just be po-faced anime zealots being pretentious.

I've always seen people just write it as "FLCL". I've actually seen it (somehow--I don't watch anime very often at all and I don't remember how I ended up watching this one), and from what little I can remember it's pretty good, though weird. And it's only six episodes, so it didn't take that long to get through the whole thing.

[emotional leper]

If you ever get around to Toronto, there is a very large Asian Mall there where you can get extremely cheap HKs of practically any anime you want.

I'm there! *buys ticket, packs underwear*

They usually devolve into me smacking someone for saying 'desu' too much.

ARGH! I hate the 'desu' thing! I've seen at least two anime series where some character or other says 'desu' at the end of every sentence for no apparent reason. Makes me want to punch people. Damn you, Negima! Actually, Negima has multiple offenders, in that there's also someone who says 'de gozaru' all the time. I think that's basically the same as 'desu', but marginally less annoying.

The 'desu' thing, or rather, the over use of it, is supposed to indicate childishness/cuteness, I believe. The problem is, you have gaijin who watch anime and then think that the copula is supposed to be used ALL THE TIME.