Monday, January 17, 2011

[Facts]Beelzebub

Sometimes, as you probably already know it, Japanese come up with weird things in their animes/mangas/games and well in pop culture in general.
I don't catch all references, far from it, but it happens that I'm French and that Japanese apparently love to twist around French language and various other French things.
This season appears to be pretty rich with such occurences so let me start with the one I thought to be the most funny.
The culprit is Beelzebub, Ryuuhei Tamura's Jump serie recently made into an anime. (The name of the serie itself is a reference to mythological stuff but I'm not sure if you're interested in that ^^)

Anyway, as I was saying Beelzebub has a particular character named Alain Delon, have a pic below :
From there, nothing more memorable than the fact it does indeed sound French and it would be forgettable if another fact didn't come in consideration, mainly that Alain Delon exists. In the real world I mean.

And this is how he looks like :
He is/was a pretty popular actor so if you're interested, as usual go check The Wiki article

Saturday, January 15, 2011

Winter Season 2011, 1st impression post

Since I'm that lazy you'll have a bundled first impression post, aside from my lazyness the obvious reason is that some shows already have their second episode and at my speed you probably won't have a first impression post until the third episode would air so I don't see any use in that.
Anyway, shall we start?

- Dragon Crisis : Why do I start by that I have no idea because it honestly has been pretty unimpressive and unoriginal. I mean you can do more interesting than a young boy rescuing a young girl who happens to be a dragon, rare treasure his cousin has been dying to discover, and who happens to be, oh so by chance, to be targetted by some evil organization?
It still managed to interest me enough to prompt me to watch the second episode, I mean, it ended with what seemed to be a mad scientist arriving at their appartment in a fucking helicopter, talk about random events.
Thankfully I'm not watching this for the plot, I wasn't expecting anything and I didn't get much so everything is fine.

- Onii-chan etc : Wasn't watching for the plot either, and I wasn't expecting anything, and I was so right. Dropped. Aside from the voice acting there's really nothing to save and I may be a fangirl but even Toyonaga Toshiyuki can't save something with bad music, bad character design, bad animation and bad plot.

- Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magica : I honestly was about to drop after the first episode, but I was strong and continued because Kajiura Yuki is my music goddess and Shaft one of my favourite studio. It happens not to be as bad as I thought. I still can't deem it the best anime of the season, definitely not, but I'm at least a bit interested, even if I don't like the character design and the main character annoys me to death, the blonde looks like she's hiding something, thus I'm curious.

- Level E : Something I didn't intend to watch, I'm definitely curious about the alien and the voice acting is good. It has a dark atmosphere and some funny/ridiculous moments.
I can't say whether or not I really did like this, so as a matter of fact I'll have to keep watching to find out.

- Kore wa Zombie desu ka? : Another one I didn't want to watch, I'm fucking glad I did though, don't think I ever laughed that much at an anime, I won't say anything not to spoil the jokes but just go watch it's ridiculous.
There's one thing I fear though, which is the second episode. I'm not sure if they will be able to keep up on that level of crazyness in the long run.
But I sure do hope they do because this first episode was beyond awesome.

- Beelzebub : Another ridiculous thing, pretty fun, and I somehow have a huge crush on the delinquant type of characters, I'm in heaven with this.
For this one my fear is the usual Jump thing, meaning, fucking slow animes and neverending fights. Please do something else.

- Gosick : Led by another one of my music god, Nakagawa Kotaro, I started this. I'm happy I did. It gives a nice, dark atmosphere, the main girl is not annoying, I'll be even ready to call her cute, the main guy on the other seems to be some generic weakling but he's not.
The plot is interesting, it went smoothly from a school setting to a closed-space murder to a ship setting Umineko, in 2 episodes.
I like it quite a lot.

- Starry Sky : Honestly, there's nothing really interesting going on there if you're not a fan of the game, you just get to "know" the characters, watching for the seiyuu anyway so I don't care much, and it's 11 minutes long.

- Hourou Musuko : Was expecting a lot from this, wasn't disappointed, it's a bit confusing at the beginning because all the characters look the same but it goes better really quickly and it has an interesting artstyle.
I'm curious about how it'll continue.

- Fractale : Was curious about this too, I feared some kind of un-understandable psychedelic stuff, yet it's easy to understand.
It feels calm and peaceful, the same kind of feeling you get from Ghibli movies, and yet it also feels like Orwell's 1984, and trigger a case in your brain which actually makes you think about the world we live in and such. A great one. Gotta hand it to NoitaminA to come up with such intellectual stuff.
For now tied with Gosick for the first place in my heart. Though both are really different.

Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Fall season 2010, final thoughts

This anime blogger should definitely do what she said she would, anyway, I'm too lazy to make a huge long ass post about each one of the Fall season 2010 anime I watched so let's just re-use what I did before and hope my next post won't be in 3 months.
I will do a first impression post for the Winter season though, once I'll have watched the NoitaminA things.

- Togainu no Chi : Eeh, no not really. I mean it was cool to see them move and talk and all but there's nothing else to it (if you're not into staring at Shiki, and even if you are I'm sorry but it's poor).
The animation has been weird all along, thank you for showing the rainy sky during the Shiki vs. Akira fight, thank you for the pinkish fluo blood, some people said the only good thing was the music, I don't think it's bad but I won't say it's enough to save the show.
In the end, thank you for transforming the wonderful seinen I was waiting for into a half assed tragic friendship/love story anime where fights become secondary and focusing on some of the most annoying male main characters ever made.
Next time you want to animate a yaoi game, either focus on the plot and if you really want to put some BL in it, please, go all out instead of imitating a shoujo.

- Tegami Back Reverse : Still on going, I sense some fillers though.

- Shinrei Tantei Yakumo : The last episodes made me forgive everything, leaves room for a second season though and it probably won't happen. Well at least things are resolved from the time being.
The girl in ove is at least not annoying in this, Yakumo is funny to watch but the coolest character has to be detective Gotou.
Guess you can't do anything against the power of experience (read I have a fetish for old men but it's a secret)

- Hyakka Ryoran Samurai Girls : Nice art still, it evolved into something with a plot, a bit complicated and actually less interesting with it. And I don't like the main guy, the fact that all the girls are all over him despite him not doing anything is beyond me.

- Hakuouki II : I think I've been trolled, such an ending was totally unexpected but I think I liked it.
Other than that well, the cheesiness almost made me puke, not to mention slightly OOC Hijikata.

- Bakuman : Still on going, slow as hell, I suggest you watch the anime before reading the manga because the adaptation might be too good.

- Arakawa Under the Bridge x Bridge : AWESOME. Even crazier than the first season. I suggest you watch this if only for the last episode, aka the fight between Sister and Maria, and also to have the chance to hear Takai's OP

- Kami Nomi zo Shiru Sekai : Don't know. Liked bits of it but disliked others, I can't even say what I liked and what I disliked. Will watch the second season anyway

- Kuragehime : I'm in love with this, it's really, really cute and the characters are all adorable, they're adorable because they're weird. I want more of this and I'm definitely going to read the manga.

- Otome Yokai Zakuro : One of the best anime of the season and probably the biggest surprise, a wonderful collection of EDs, a wonderful collection of seiyuu, traditionnal like music, some romance perfectly integrated in the plot. A favourite of mine.

- Panty and Stockings with Garterbelt : I feared the jokes would go down, they didn't. Wonderful ending, the troll like of ending, can't wait for the second season.
Liked the animation, made me laugh, liked the characters, Brief surprised me, Panty and Stockings did too, really loved the music video and the transformation scene is beautiful.
/brb, hunting cosplays

- Star Driver Kagayaki no Takuto : Still on going as well. Plot appears, the rest start to get old after 13 episodes

- Soredemo Machi wa Mawatteiru : Worth watching if only for the School Festival episode (or you can just check the song) Sometimes gave off some Bakemonogatari vibes but very briefly, forgettable, probably impossible to marathon though

- Oreimo : Surprise there, never intended to watch, was drawn by the plot, was kept by Kuroneko (I have a crush on Kuroneko) and I have to admit that I was curious to see what would Kirino torture her brother with next.

Other things which ended :
- Denyuden : How could this even be considered an ending?
But otherwise really nice, lots of good characters, fun, not a single annoying character, seemingly twisted ones who care, seemingly nice ones twisted and evil, good seiyuus, good plot, nice battles, no really one of my favourite thing

- Shiki : You liked Higurashi? You will like Shiki, except Shiki is much better and waaay easier to understand.
It has some very, very disturbing scenes though and no censorship, at all.
The characters are all interesting, the plot is as well, the only thing I'm wondering now is how they will continue after this.
Guess I'll know when the French releases of the manga will have caught up.

- Nurarihyon no Mago : Typical Jump stuff, meaning neverending battles, but it has Yôkai, good seiyuu and interesting plot. For the next season, just please, faster.