Your Average Otaku

Realised how long it had been since I last posted on Tumblr (about two years ago), and I slowly got round to deciding whether to return to it or not bother. As you can see I decided to get back to it and in celebration I watched a whole bunch of Anime to catch up to the new season. Just in the last few days I watched a lot of last Season’s anime including but not limited to: Phi Brain, Amagami SS+, Ano Natsu de Matteru, Daily Life of Highschool Boys and Kill Me Baby. There are probably a few others but I forget, not that it matters since I am now officially on the current season.

It seems I’m going to be busy on the Anime front since I have started 16 new series (should be 17 by the 26th).

I haven’t done much in the 2 years I’ve been off Tumblr apart from leaving mandatory education and embarking on further education, hopefully I will continue writing on here (longer than last time anyway). It’s good to be back.

Just a quick top ten list of the years anime, mostly for personal reasons not because any are exceptional. (most are though)

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As we approach the holidays (Christmas & New Year) it is a time of festive and jolly actions, of giving and celebration. Christmas is always an important time of the year even for those who detest it. Its impact upon us either cheers us up immensely or puts us into a near suicidal mood. (depending on the person obviously)

Personally for me Christmas is a time to relax (not that different to normal) and enjoy a day with my family but it also signifies that time of the year; the time when the final Anime episodes of the year are airing and as I watch these saddening goodbyes I die a little on the inside.

At least normally, this year I’m a bit too busy to reflect upon the years Anime, even my top ten list was done in little under an hour, without much time to consider each one (though I have until the end of the year to post it so I can still make changes if anything comes to mind).

Alas the end of the year has come. So I have decided my next review will be my last for this year, then I will post my top ten and stop blogging till next year (unless something interesting happens). I have decided to review Amagami SS next, a series that has grown on me over the last couple of seasons.

Action and Adventure
    (x) .hack//SIGN
    ( ) Airmaster
    ( ) Battle Arena Toshinden
    (x) Bleach
    ( ) Blood+
    ( ) Burst Angel
    ( ) City Hunter
    ( ) Cowboy Bebop
    (x) Dragonball
    (x) Flame of Recca
    ( ) GetBackers
    (x) Inu Yasha
    ( ) Lupin III (any)
    (x) Mai-HiME
    (x) Naruto
    (x) One Piece
    (x) Tenjou Tenge
    ( ) TRIGUN
    ( ) Saiyuki
    (x) Yu Yu Hakusho
    Total Here: 10/20


    II. Comedy and Parody
    ( ) 2x2 = Shinobuden
    ( ) Adventures of the Mini Goddesses
    ( ) Azumanga Daioh
    (x) Bokusatsu Tenshi Dokuro-chan
    (x) Di Gi Charat
    (x) Dragon Half
    ( ) Excel Saga
    (x) Fruits Basket
    ( ) Galaxy Angel
    ( ) Here is Greenwood
    ( ) Kodomo no Omocha
    ( ) Kyou Kara Maou!
    (x) Midori Days
    (x) Ouran Koukou Host Club
    ( ) Pani Poni Dash
    ( ) Project A-ko
    (x) Ranma ½
    (x) Tenchi Muyo
    ( ) Those Who Hunt Elves
    ( ) Urusei Yatsura
    Total Here: 8/20


    III. Drama and Miscellaneous
    ( ) Beck
    ( ) Full Moon wo Sagashite
    ( ) Gankutsuou
    (x) Genshiken
    ( ) Glass Mask (original or new)
    ( ) Haibane Renmei
    ( ) Hitsuji no Uta
    (x) Honey & Clover
    ( ) Kaleido Star
    ( ) Last Exile
    ( ) Le Portrait de Petite Cossette
    ( ) Monster
    ( ) Paradise Kiss
    (x) Princess Mononoke
    ( ) Read or Die OVA
    ( ) Speed Grapher
    ( ) Twin Spica
    ( ) Weiss Kreuz
    ( ) Wings of Honneamise
    (x) Yakitate!! Japan
    Total Here: 4/20


    IV. Ecchi/Mature
    (x) Agent AIKa
    ( ) Cutey Honey
    ( ) Ebichu
    (x) Golden Boy
    ( ) Grenadier
    (x) Hand Maid May
    (x) He Is My Master
    (x) Iketeru Futari
    ( ) La Blue Girl
    ( ) Lingerie Senshi Papillon Rose
    (x) Mahoromatic
    ( ) Mezzo Forte
    ( ) Miyuki-chan in Wonderland
    ( ) My Dear Marie
    ( ) Najica Blitz Tactics
    (x) Negima
    ( ) Puni Puni Poemi
    ( ) Urotsukidoji: Legend of the Overfiend
    ( ) Yumeria
    Total Here: 7/20


    V. Fantasy and Supernatural
    ( ) Angel Sanctuary
    ( ) Aquarian Age
    (x) Berserk
    (x) El Hazard
    (x) Final Fantasy Unlimited
    (x) Fullmetal Alchemist
    (x) Howl’s Moving Castle
    ( ) Magic Knight Rayearth
    ( ) Mushishi
    (x) Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind
    ( ) Record of Lodoss War
    (x) Scrapped Princess
    ( ) Slayers
    ( ) Tales of Eternia
    ( ) Trinity Blood
    ( ) Tsubasa Chronicle
    ( ) Vampire Hunter D
    ( ) Violinist of Hameln
    ( ) Vision of Escaflowne
    ( ) X: TV
    Total Here: 7/20


    VI. Historical and Alternate History
    ( ) Anne of Green Gables
    (x) Basilisk
    ( ) Barefoot Gen
    (x) Chrono Crusade
    ( ) Grave of the Fireflies
    ( ) Fire Tripper
    ( ) Kaidomaru
    ( ) Legend of Condor Hero
    ( ) Millennium Actress
    ( ) Nadia - Secret of Blue Water
    ( ) Ninja Scroll
    ( ) Otogizoushi
    (x) Peacemaker Kurogane
    ( ) Porco Rosso
    ( ) Rose of Versailles
    (x) Rurouni Kenshin
    ( ) Samurai 7 
    ( ) Samurai Champloo
    ( ) Steel Angel Kurumi
    ( ) Victorian Romance Emma
    Total Here: 4/20


    VII. Kids and Family
    ( ) Angelic Layer
    (x) Astro Boy
    (x) Beyblade
    ( ) Castle in the Sky
    (x) Detective Conan
    (x) Digimon
    ( ) Doraemon
    (x) Hamtaro
    (x) Kiki’s Delivery Service
    ( ) Kimba the White Lion
    ( ) Monster Rancher
    ( ) My Neighbor Totoro
    (x) Pokemon
    ( ) Samurai Pizza Cats
    ( ) Sazae-san
    ( ) SD Gundam Force
    ( ) Sonic X
    ( ) Speed Racer
    (x) Spirited Away
    (x) Yu-Gi-Oh
    Total Here: 9/20


    VIII. Magical Girls and Boys
    ( ) Cardcaptor Sakura
    (x) D*N Angel
    ( ) Earth Girl Arjuna
    (x) Erementar Gerad
    ( ) Hime-chan no Ribbon
    ( ) Kamikaze Kaitou Jeanne
    ( ) Magic Users Club
    ( ) Magical Girl Pretty Sammy
    ( ) Magical Stage Fancy La La
    ( ) Mahou no Star Magical Emi
    ( ) Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha
    ( ) Mythical Detective Loki Ragnarok
    ( ) Ojamajo DoReMi
    ( ) Oku-sama wa Mahou Shoujo
    ( ) Pretear
    (x) Sailor Moon
    ( ) Saint Tail
    ( ) Tokyo Mew Mew
    ( ) Ultra Maniac
    ( ) Wedding Peach
    Total Here: 3/20


    IX. Romance
    (x) Ah! My Goddess (OVA)
    (x) Ai Yori Aoshi
    (x) Air
    ( ) Ayashi no Ceres
    ( ) Boys Be
    (x) Chobits
    ( ) Fushigi Yuugi
    ( ) Hana Yori Dango
    ( ) His and Her Circumstances
    ( ) Kimagure Orange Road
    ( ) Kimi ga Nozomu Eien
    (x) Love Hina
    ( ) Maison Ikkoku
    ( ) Marmalade Boy
    ( ) Peach Girl
    ( ) Piano
    (x) Please Teacher!
    ( ) SaiKano
    (x) To Heart
    ( ) Video Girl Ai
    Total Here: 7/20


    X. Science-Fiction
    ( ) Appleseed
    ( ) Blue Seed
    ( ) Bubblegum Crisis
    ( ) Crest of the Stars
    ( ) Galaxy Express 999
    ( ) Gundam (any)
    (x) Macross (any)
    ( ) Outlaw Star
    ( ) Patlabor
    ( ) Planetes
    ( ) Please Save My Earth
    ( ) RahXephon
    ( ) Saber Marionette (any)
    (x) s-CRY-ed
    ( ) Soukyuu no Fafner
    ( ) Space Battleship Yamato
    ( ) Stellvia
    (x) Transformers (any)
    ( ) Voices of a Distant Star
    ( ) Xenosaga: The Animation
    Total Here: 3/20


    XI. Shounen-Ai and Shoujo-Ai
    ( ) Ai no Kusabi
    ( ) Descendants of Darkness
    ( ) Earthian
    ( ) FAKE
    ( ) Fish in the Trap
    ( ) Galaxy Fraulin Yuna
    ( ) Gravitation
    ( ) Haru wo Daiteita
    ( ) Kannazuki no Miko
    ( ) Kizuna
    ( ) Lesson XX
    ( ) Loveless
    ( ) Maria-sama ga Miteru
    ( ) Mirage of Blaze
    ( ) Oniisama E
    ( ) Seikimatsu Darling
    ( ) Song of the Wind in the Trees
    ( ) Sukisho
    ( ) Yami to Boushi to Hon no Tabibito
    ( ) Zetsuai/Bronze
    Total Here:  0/20


    XII. Sports
    ( ) Ace wo Nerae
    (x) Ashita no Joe
    ( ) Ayane’s High Kick
    (x) Baki the Grappler
    ( ) Battle Athletes
    ( ) Buzzer Beater
    (x) Captain Tsubasa
    (x) Eyeshield 21
    ( ) Ginban Kaleidoscope
    (x) Hajime no Ippo
    (x) Hikaru no Go
    ( ) Initial D
    (x) Major
    ( ) Monkey Turn
    ( ) One Pound Gospel
    (x) Prince of Tennis
    ( ) Princess Nine
    (x) Slam Dunk
    (x) Suzuka
    ( ) Wild Striker
    Total Here: 10/20


    XIII. Surreal and Psychological
    (x) Akira
    ( ) Betterman
    ( ) Boogiepop Phantom
    (x) Elfen Lied
    (x) FLCL

    (x) Gantz

    ( ) Ghost in the Shell
    ( ) Hellsing
    ( ) Jigoku Shoujo
    ( ) Karas
    ( ) Madlax
    ( ) Melody of Oblivion
    (x) Neon Genesis Evangelion
    ( ) Noir
    ( ) Paranoia Agent
    ( ) Perfect Blue *
    ( ) Princess Tutu
    ( ) Revolutionary Girl Utena
    ( ) Serial Experiments Lain
    ( ) Texhnolyze
    Total Here: 5/20
     
    Grand Total: 77/260

This ova series lived fully up to my expectations, it was good for a OVA (Original Video Animation) series. I’ll go through what I thought was good first. The animation was great, fine, spectacular; how well it stuck to the manga was also good. The transformation scene in the first episode was enough to convince me to rate it a 9/10. As far as OVAs go it was really good. Probably good enough to make it a full blown series, which is what pissed me off the most. 

It was an OVA series, that is what was wrong with it. Everything in it would have been fine in a normal series. You know what I would have done? Just made a bloody series! A simple 13 episode series maybe prolonged over the year instead of confined to a season, but a series all the same. The pacing they took for the ova would work in the series, following that pacing the series would probably end just before the final fight.

Episode 4 ends on Negi mastering magic erebia (one of his moves) and then episode 5 is a waste of space, all about Yue. Thinking of it like that episode 5-6 would be him training and general gathering of the ala alba (Negi’s group). Episode 7-8 (possibly only 7) would be the Negi vs Rakan fight (by far the best fight ever). The rest would be mostly preparation for the final fight and the conflict in the magic world as well as the remaining realisations the characters have, hopefully that makes episode 13 just as they leave for the final fight. This makes the movie fully about the defeat of Fate (main bad guy).

Basically I feel the only mistakes they made was making it an OVA in the first place and making episode 5 a bonus episode. Still, it’s Negima how can I not love it.

p.s. I take note that episode 5 was not that bad but it had no place in such a short series, in a 13 episode series I would have accepted it as a filler episode.

Been a long time since I posted, mainly since I have been sleeping. now for a quick recap of my last few days…

Last week I found out that I was going to a party, so I set preparations up, my preparations being getting enough sleep to stay up longer than usual for the party. Anyway after missing three days of school (Tuesday,Wednesday and Thursday) I returned to find out that the party was on the Friday not Saturday like I had originally thought. After quickly getting sorted I went to the party. 

So I arrived, didn’t drink, played truth or dare (the strip version) and then slept. In between those moments I was surrounded by a mass amount of people complaining about their lives in one way or another. The mood of grew heavier as the night went on as everyone flaked off into their own rooms or corners of rooms as it was. After a brief two hour sleep by (almost) everyone the overall mood improved and everyone was on talking terms again.

That was the only big event recently, other than that I got re-hooked back onto one of my favorite anime series: Toradora. The series itself doesn’t have much to it to be honest. In truth it doesn’t have anything obvious that makes it unique or outstanding; not the story nor the setting. It has nothing on the surface that would make the average person get excited over.

All the series has, which gets more apparent as you watch, is bloody good creator. Yuyuko Takemiya. This person, nay God has made a series that will have a permanent place in my top ten Anime of all time. She made the most lovable, complete and addicting characters I’ve ever seen. With every character having a important and brilliant flaw in their lives. The series appears to be a pretty cliche story, a classic school-set romance, but it feels like so much more. 

So as an overview this series has pretty average ratings, apart from the two things: the characters (which I’ve already mentioned) and the animation/artwork style which make the series feel bright and happy. This series is in my top ten anime of all time so therefore I cannot give it a ranking, as my top ten is impossible to rank.

p.s. The series cringing parts, are doubly bad on this re-watch, making the series all the better.

p.s.s. damn now I want to watch it again.

Fortune Arterial Akai Yakusoku

This Series came as a surprise to me, It was one that, for some reason, I hadn’t heard of it before the season started so decided to give it a go. I was surprised.

The series itself is not the mush-romance I thought it would be when I saw it was based on a visual novel (basically an interactive story, normally featuring porn, though their are exceptions), instead it seems to focus on the main characters developing friendship with the other characters and his trouble fitting in. Recently though I had to rethink my opinion on this series, as it changed from the nice, light stuff and seemed to be going towards a darker route, basically it started to focus on the main heroine (vampire) and her increasing ‘appetite’.The darker side I thought was more interesting and addicting, although the first half of the series compliments it well.

For the original premise of the series it has done really well, it is something easy to watch but is much more complex than Oreimo (last review) it is light and serious at the same time however ridiculous that sounds. For a series based on a Visual Novel it is much better than most such as Chaos;Head but it still cannot compare to stuff like Fate Stay Night. 

The latest episode though was a bit of a boring one, the start of the episode as well as the end of the last one makes it feel like the story is finally going to enter its final stages, but then it gradually draws away from that and starts to go back to the light stuff. It ruins the atmosphere and pacing of the anime. Though apart from that one problem the series has almost no flaws.

So far in the season I would rate it 2nd and in hindsight move Oriemo down to 4th. My top ten list for this season is going to be hard to do.

After being told that I was wasting my tumblr account I was advised by my overly caring big brother Mike, that I should use it to share my thoughts on the anime and manga that I have seen. I decided to take this advice and thus I changed my blog title and description to suit its new purpose.

In commemoration of the event I have decided to share my thoughts on the current season throughout the week. starting with the most popular series this season: Ore no Imouto ga Konnani Kawaii Wake ga Nai, or in plain english: My Little Sister Can’t be This Cute. Oreimo as it is now called, is probably the most known series of this season apart from the new Pokemon. Which is shit.

Contrary to Oreimo’s title it is not a forbidden love anime and there is no romance between the main character and his sister, who are blood related so the people that watched it in hope of such a development will be disappointed. In fact it reminds me of the anime Nogizaka Haruka no Himitsu, both being about the highs and lows of being an otaku (a manga and anime addict) in modern day Japanese society.

The series is mainly about the main protagonist’s little sister who, on the surface is perfect at everything she does; sports, academics, even a modeling job so she has her own income. When Kyousuke finds out about her secret he helps her keep it and in the end stops their parents throwing her secret stash of anime out.

The feel of the series is quite light, something easy to watch after watching something like Togainu no Chi. It requires no real thinking, so you don’t really have to focus much to get what is going on in each episode, though this makes it sound boring and predictable, the series, although simple is incredibly fun to watch and the thirty minute episode length feels like a few meager minutes.

Usually 12 episode anime series have two arcs split into six episodes each. Oriemo has a 3 episode mini-arc at the start to introduce the characters in more depth than the average series does. It is not clear if the rest of the series is one large arc that has slow development, or if it is just waiting for the last couple episodes to hit us with the closing arc. Filler episodes or not each episode feels important in the development of the story which seems to be spiraling down as I feel that she is still hiding something from the other characters.

The only issue with this series that I can think of, is that for such a light series it does not have enough romance in it, Nogizaka Haruka no Himitsu didn’t have this problem as the main characters were free to go out. Oreimo unfortunately can’t do this. They have tried to put a little romance in it by giving Kyousuke a childhood friend, who is clearly meant to be the love interest. This is not good enough however as the viewer (namely me) wants him to get with Ayase one of his sister’s friends who is a much more interesting character.

Overall this series lives up to the hype placed upon it by the media. I would give it a 8 out of 10 and no.2 rating in this season’s anime so far.