Archive for June, 2006

The Growing up of Suzumiya Haruhi

Published by
kimagure
at June 24, 2006 in The Melancholy of Suzumiya Haruhi. Closed

Haruhi and Kyon, sitting by a tree

Episode 12 was a interesting watch for me. I watch a lot of anime right before I go to bed, and after I finished this episode I kinda went to bed not knowing what to think. On my way into work the next morning, I thought about it for a bit. While dodging through rush hour traffic, I came upon the realization that this was one of my favorite episodes. It also solidified the fact that this anime which I knew nothing about, is quickly becoming high on the list of my favorites. When episode 14 finally airs, I’ll put that into more words, but for now I have one thing to say about episode 12.

Haruhi is showing signs of growing up. Kyon didn’t even see it coming, since he thought that she was just up to no good as usual. His view is clouded by the nuttiness of Suzumiya Haruhi, and Mikuru’s ample assets. But in this episode, near the end, she shows us that her heart is in the right place and that she can get into the world she lives in.

I was very impressed by the writing and direction of this episode, from the impressive concert sequence to the easter eggs (Haado Gei…fooooooooooooooooo), this was a nice way to segue into the final two episodes of this series.

The Third: Aoi Hitomi no Shoujo

Published by
kimagure
at June 4, 2006 in The Third. 1 Comment

The Third: Aoi Hitomi no Shoujo

I really don’t know where to begin on this one. How about, “Just what is this show about?” Episodes one to four:

The Third is about a 17 year old girl named Honoka and her artificially intelligent sand tank Bogie. Honoka is a “Jack-of-all-trades”, but she’s a little better looking than Bruce Campbell. Basically, she takes jobs as she can get them and uses the money to support herself, keep her tank in good running shape, and buy cool power suits when the opportunity arises. See Honoka lives in a post apocalyptic Earth where something horrible happened in a war and pretty much everything on Earth is now a desert. The rulers of earth seem to be The Third, a humanoid looking race with a third red eye in the middle of their foreheads. The governing power keeps a tight rule over the use of technology, lest the human race become wise to using it in a destructive fashion once again. They’re still a little mysterious right now.

One night, Honoka runs into a guy just poking about in the desert, and dispatches the ants that are about to eat him for late night dinner. The guy’s name is Ikus, and he has really great hair, it’s just nice hair, not spiky for once. Honoka saves him, and they go on their way. Along that way, Honoka makes arrangements to purchase a PSP, because she gets bored with Ikus and needs to play some video….oh wait, not that kind of PSP. Actually it’s a mobile armor suit.

During a battle to save the people that helped her restore the PSP suit it’s revealed that Honoka also has a third eye on her forehead as well. Hers is blue though, and that’s all they’ve told us so far.

There are a lot of elements of other anime in here that may or may not have been intentionally similar. I’m kind of feeling a little bit of Appleseed here, maybe it’s just me. The show is actually one of my favorites this spring season, and it has nothing to do with Honoka actually killing a ton of spiders in the first episode. The action is all well done, the mystery of the main characters is intriguing, and I like the exposition so far. The turnkey episode is the fourth, which is a little later than most, but late enough to get to know the characters well before the meat of the story takes place.

The animation is well done, the character designs are lovely, and the voice acting is also executed nicely. Very interested in this show. I guess I really like swords and tanks.

Update
I actually thought about this some more during work today. While doing so, it strikes me that there are many anime that seem to have influenced this show. The satellites/colonies that fall from the sky remind me of the colony drops used in Mobile Suit Gundam. The desert earth and jack-of-all trades aspect reminds me of SunaBozu, just less perverted. I’m sure there are more that are escaping me right now. I guess the bottom line is that maybe this is not all that original, but I still enjoy the premise and concept of the series.

Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha and Nanoha A’s

Published by
kimagure
at June 4, 2006 in Nanoha. 2 Comments

It's about to go down, right here, right now.

So, with the recommendation of the #animeblogger IRC channel, I watched and finished Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha and Nanoha A’s. I’m not going to go into plot detail because since these are older shows, they’ve been written to death.

I’ll be honest, I’ve not watched too much of the magical girl genre. I’m painfully aware of Sailor Moon and many of the other shows that followed in its wake. My anime group from college fiercely made fun of Sailor Moon and Dragonball. I watched enough of Dragonball to know that I hated it, and none of Sailor Moon. It wasn’t until it made it to American television that I did get a glimpse of the show, and what I saw was just mediocre and not worth the time I felt I could give to it.

So maybe that’s why I stayed away from the genre. I did really enjoy pretty much any parody of the genre. So here I was a couple years ago, when Nanoha first came out and blissfully decided to ignore it. I get this blog, and look what happens. So here are my thoughts.

I felt the introduction of Nanoha’s magic powers were a little quick in the first series, but somewhat necessary to the plot. While the plot seemed to move at a rather quick pace, it still felt like they weren’t drilling me with a huge amount of detail. The story was a rather standard rivalry fight story, with Nanoha deeply rooted in the bonds of friendship, to the point that she even extended that to her enemy, Fate. Overall, I consider the first season of Nanoha to be very much an introduction to the franchise.

The second series didn’t leave much time for an explanation for anything. It hopped right into the action with the addition of several rivals. Fate and Nanoha work together here and fight against the Velka Knights of the Book of Darkness. I consider this to be the true beginning of what the franchise could be about. There likely exists a great many possibilities for other lost Logia in the universe and Nanoha and friends could continue the search. Again, Nanoha tries to negotiate with the other side, only to have to end up fighting to protect herself and her friends. In the end it’s her love and courage that reign supreme over everything.

This sounds like it could end up being a whole lot of cheese, but due to some very nice voice work and animation, it’s all very convincing. The show blends elements of magic and sci-fi rather effortlessly and works a particular magic over the viewer’s heart. I do think the target audience is a little younger than I am, okay, a lot younger.

I also enjoyed that each season’s final episode was essentially a wrap up episode. It’s rare with constrained animation budgets to see a full episode be devoted to denouement. I mean watching something like Gundam Seed (not recommended) and hitting episode 50 and wondering how it ends is really crappy. In this though I felt like I understood the direction that the characters were headed, and really felt it to be a nice touch.

So, I recommend this title for all ages, even if we older folk have to turn our heads away from the screen when the transformations happen. ^_^