Review: Katanagatari

It's a 2009 anime I almost forgot to review. I stumbled upon a samurai themed manga and suddenly remembered about it.

Studio: White Fox
Author: Nisio Isin

Katanagatari is based on a light novel, which explains all the dialog version tl;dr throughout the series. even the words of a dying person is very looooooooooooooooooooooong. The story is about Togame, a self-procaimed strategist who seeks to collect 12 legendary deviant swords forged by the legendary swordsmith Kiki Shikizaki. She can't fight, however, so she finds the head of Kyotouryuu style, Yasuri Shichika to help her out. The reason why she finds this particular guy is because this fighting style requires no sword, hence he will be least likely to be obsessed with the legendary swords.

For an extremely mysterious girl, she talks quite a lot. And Shichika originally begins as a bland character, but this is due to him growing up in an isolated island, alone with his sick elder sister. While they travel together, i expected some typical awkward romance between the main guy and the girl. But I'm glad the emotions weren't that obvious and focused more on hunting the swords. I guess the reason why I picked this up is because I LIKE SWORDS and to my surprise the blades aren't really your typical looking katanas.

apparently this is also a sword

Each of the people wielding the swords, are either good guys, or bad guys. And Shichika, having no sense of right and wrong, does not feel guilty killing anyone. Which is great because I'm sick of looking at goody-two-shoes dragging through the episodes just because of his sense of justice. And Togame herself isn't that weak emotionally - maybe it has something to do with her tragic past. So it doesn't disturb the pace of the story much.

As they collect all the swords, I wondered if they can really fit into the each of the 12 episodes. And I also wondered what are they doing to do once they collect them, what would happen once they do so? In the end we're surprised with a plot twist, and the ending has another twist which I'm glad isn't so emotional in spite of a certain great loss.

Long story short, the whole thing is about honourable and fearless samurais. For something fresh there isn't much talk about relationship and bonds, just personal inner dilemmas about warrior related things. Politics, selfishness, loyalty, hunger for power and greediness. Just those. And oh I forgot to mention that the antagonists are a group of ninjas. And they're defeated sobs.

I absolutely love the art and graphics of the anime. It reminds me of the game Okami, but not exactly the same. Just that it's nice to see something else for a change than the standard anime art. Maybe I like to see colourful things?

I didn't pay much attention to the EDs, but the whole OST is superb!! Composed by Iwasaki Taku, especially this one below

Review: Phi Brain - Kami no Puzzle (S1)

Again, was deprived of shounen, so I decided to check out Phi Brain.

Unfortunately, the fandom of this anime (or manga) isn't big, so it's very hard to find fanarts or the specific fanarts in the internet. Maybe the anime doesn't have the charm other shounen shows have and i think I can understand why. But as someone who has seen this, I'd like to recommend it to you. It's not that great, but it's not so bad either. If you're bored and have nothing else to watch, just try this for the sake of killing time.

Studio: Sunrise

Previously I said that KARUTA is serious business. This time, PUZZLE is serious business.

Rather than having magical powers or ninja skills, this is a battle between intelligent people. Oh but it's not like they're challenging who's more knowledgeable than the other... it's more like how'd you use tactics to play an over-exaggerrated board game. It's not about quizzes or math whiz, but you're fighting against bad guys using the power of the brain - the typical shounen way. I think what makes this show unique is that almost all the main characters are very bright, regardless of their personality, and same goes for the villains' side. Like just because you look badass and lazy, doesn't mean your muscles overpower your brains. It's very different from an average shounen genre where you need to have at least one smart guy, average guy and dumb guy in one team.

So Phi Brain is about a high school kid named Daimon Kaito who walks around in casual clothes just because he has the priviledge as a title holder (Einstein). He's obsessed with puzzles, and he eats, sleeps and drink puzzles much to his childhood friend, Nonoha's annoyance. These two stumbled upon an unsolvable puzzle near their school and Kaito can't fight the urge to solve it. After going through one hell of a time solving it successfully, he was appointed as a Solver to solve other Kami no Puzzles. And the challengers are often the villain team called POG. But he does not fight alone, of course, there are a few other kids in his school with the 'title' (acknowledged as excellent Solvers) teams up with him.

And you'd think you have one character, who's not part of the smart guys, you might find her annoying but somehow I'm able to accept this 'busybody' girl. Well, she makes up with it with her power of memory and also as an all-rounder sporty girl.

something to look forward to?

But to conquer the world using puzzles and optimizing the "Phi Brain" kind of doesn't make much sense. For when the bad guy loses they'd honourably accept it... which i think, as bad guys they should've just cheated their way in. And other than puzzles another important theme is the bond between the characters. Other than that, there's this strange thing about feeling the emotions and meaning behind the puzzle. They can detect wether the puzzle has affection or hatred lolwhut i guess it takes another level of intelligence to comprehend that.

The most pointless thing about the show is that you can't seem to follow how the kids are solving the puzzle. It doesn't allow you to 'connect' with them, how they think and how they strategise, and learn to be as tactically smart as they are. They show you how the character hops from one point to the other, but not really see how the game went. Suddenly, you have a winner. If not, it's the climax where they need to decide which piece should they move. Rather than motivating viewers to improvise on their thinking skills, we're fed with the same old bonding and friendship thing. Not that it's bad but then I think it's missing the point. Well, at least this show makes the genius kids are the popular and most enviable schoolmates you could ever meet.

And then comes the even more supernatural stuff, other than the Orpheus armband which seem to accelerate your puzzle solving abilities. This supernatural interference is also one of the factors that prevents us from being able to 'connect' with the Solvers. Unfortunately, the supernatural stuff becomes even weirder near the end.

And they also have a yandere antagonist who seems pretty gay towards the protagonist. Oh don't be discourage to watch just because of that. There aren't that many subtle hints of homosexuality...

owait...

Art-wise, is just so-so. Character designs look cool too.

The reasons why I stayed loyal to the show is because of FukuJun (he played as a deliquent-like character and I love that guy most), the OST and the OP + ED is great too.

this one is by MAY'N and thanks to this i just realized how awesome her voice is. addicting song is addicting :3

If you want something a little different, like Chihayafuru, go ahead and digest this.

Review: Chihayafuru

KARUTA IS SERIOUS BUSINESS!!

Chihayafuru is about kids who are so obsessed with Karuta that they don't even think much about their future carreers, hence making the main character Chihaya Ayase lagging in Academics. However, she's so ambitious that she tries extremely hard to find members for her Karuta club. Two were people she knew from childhood who also plays Karuta, and the other two are completely new to the game but finds it very much related to their interest.

What is Karuta? Google it.

it all started with the tomboy Chihaya, who initially was only obsessed with her pretty sister who dreams to become a model... until she met Wataya Arata, a Karuta prodigy. After Wataya criticizes her childhood 'ambitions', she became intrigued with the card game. Before Wataya left the primary school, they made a promise that they'll forever be Karuta players and meet in a competition. And the habit is stuck with her until high school. Unfortunately, when she reunites with Wataya several years later, it seems that he has given up on his dreams to become the Karuta... king(?). So what to do? She has worked hard for years to become his rival, and suddenly he's no longer interested?

So being a weeabo of course I'm attracted to this anime. And in spite of being a shoujo genre, everything reminds you of your typical sports anime. Well, you have rivalry, challengers and challenges and practices. And we also learn that even if it's just a mere indoor card game, you still need to build up your stamina to endure the throughout the gameplay and improve on your speed. Chihaya, even after years of obsessing with the game, finds that she still has a lot to improve on. She may be a pro, but when she gets emotionally furstrated, that ruins all her perfect plays. By meeting her childhood friends and the newbies, it helped her improve as they provide her with statistic, morale support and a more effective way to memorize the cards.

Just like certain sports anime, the movement or skills of the characters sometimes look exaggerated. But what the heck? you want to make the story interesting, let's just consider them as metaphors.

this anime has a lovely OP

Like Kanade Oe, I'm more interested in the 100 poems and the meanings. Plus, thanks to her their school's Karuta club look loveliest in their traditional costumes. She reckons is a MUST in a traditional game, although in the modern world it is no longer practical. But the obi seemed to helped her in the game.

The show ends with some kind of hint that there'll be a second season. By the end the team has not entered the final battle yet. I guess if we're curious we should go read the manga.

I have nothing else to say but if you want a mix of sport shounen feel with a Japanese traditional indoor game, and a dash of shoujo mood, then do try this anime :3

Review: Guilty Crown

So we have another anime about some weird mecha and rebel vs goverment thingy.

We also have a high school dude with the mysterious waif, and the childhood friend. Oh let's not forget about the classmate who has a crush on the main guy.

Great... it's Code Geass all over again.

Studio: Production I.G.

Unfortunately Guilty Crown isn't as good as Code Geass, of course. I think I only watched this because there weren't many action genre during 2011 fall. And then you have a very addicting OP song by Supercell entitled "My Dearest".

In GC we have a guy with a low self-esteem who accidentally stumbles into a pink haired slut who gave him some kind of sciency magical thing that made him able to extract weapons out of people's hearts. They're called VOIDs. And from an unexplained logic only people below 17 years old can produce these Voids, and hence the rebel army consists of a bunch of teenagers who just want to kick adults' arses. High school kids have an excuse to rule the school or something. Also, the most interesting part is each person has a unique Void; it can be a sword, a camera, bandages etc... and each has its own property.

And then this slut shamelessly barged into the boy's house, and not to mention he lives with a MILF who's completely okay with the slut living together. And eventually, as predicted, they fell for each other probably they were attracted to one another's insecurities (let's not consider that as a spoiler). The boy was obliged to join the rebel army (Funeral Parlor) because he has the power that was meant for the fukken hot blonde leader. This blonde guy can see Voids within the youths so they have to work together to make their terrorsit mission effective.

So all this chaotic thing is due to the Lost Christmas which happened 10 years prior to the story (it must alwaaaayyyyssss be ten years ago). Useless boy, hot blonde and slut seemed to be related to it, just that one of them experienced amnesia (oh this is so uncommon!). And since then some kind of magical cancer that turns people into breakable crystal started to spread. There are also science facility, which makes me question IS THIS REALLY SCIENCE FICTION with all your magical Void and magical cancer stuff??

you'll have a mahou shoujo transformation scene in a sci-fi show... and it makes me wonder where did she get those clothes?

Towards the end the supernatural magical part becomes even more ridiculous. I don't even want to mention it here lol.

pfft- i have nothing else to say about the plot. So I'm moving on to the characters a bit. Some of them are really great, but unfortunately for the main hero, he isn't anything special. There isn't much improvement in his character, but he did went downhill in the second half. Pink haired slut isn't anything special either. I don't feel anything between them, the so-called romance part, that's why i'm just guessing the attraction is due to both being boring characters. When hot blonde is the leader, all the tactical war stuff was superb. Then the low self-esteem guy takes the lead, things became stupider. But he has his 'shadow king', codename "Sugar". He's a bit of a scumbag but I kind of liked him. And also the seitoukaichou girl deserves to die, rather than that particular helpful girl... :(

Let's not forget the girl in the wheelchair, the GAR-est character in the anime, and the best partner for the useless guy if she's not always with the neko-girl. I also love the other blonde guy who sides the gov, he reminds me of Draco Malfoy, and it's really too bad he isn't given enough time to... like... join the good side because I think he's really a sweet boy.

in GC you control mechas by sleeping, and once you get attacked you'll experience some kind of orgasm lol. So where's Daryl's version...

Art and animation are pretty. Just that I'm most disturbed by slut girls impractical combat costume. Yeah i know she's an idol in the story (but that doesn't seem to be a big deal, and then she has no personality) but that doesn't mean it's completely okay to dress like a whore while you're fighting robots. Not gonna get started with why only the girls are given fanservice-y costume compared to the guys lol. Now let's move on to the mecha - not very memorable. I'm no mecha fan but from the very few robot themed shows I know a good mecha when i see one (I think? LOL).

I know some may enjoy this show but the overall quality isn't that great. Well, if the show is that terrible I would've dropped it halfway. But I successfully finished it, only to provide a negative review for those who stumbled upon my humble blog.

Gai and Daryl. I'm not even gonna bother putting Shu here cos he looks as boring as his character is muahahahah

Review: Rise of the Guardians

This should be an anime blog but how the hell does this end up here?
Well, simply because it's an animation. Why... I should've included Disney's Brave first but that was a long time ago.

Today I just learnt that Rise of the Guardians is loosely based on William Joyce's The Guardians of Childhood series. Ah I guess it looks like each of the characters have their own backstory, and this movie simply compiles everything. Directed by Peter Ramsey, starring, Chris Pine, Jude Law, Hugh Jackman (omfg), Alec Balwdin, and Isla Fisher.

So the story is about childhood imaginary beings like Santa Claus, Tooth Fairy, Easter Bunny and Sandman, who literally came to life in this show. They exist, and the only way to make children believe in them is not necessarily by showing up in their doorstep. As long as they give presents every Christmas, provide fabulous eggs for Easter Egg Hunt, leave a quarter for a tooth under your bed and allow you to have the sweetest dreams... they'll believe in you.

However, Jack Frost, even after a three hundred years remains as a figurative speech. And so we have the teenage boy who yearns to be noticed kind of thing. As you can see, he's the main character, who's later recruited as one of the Guardians (along with the four i mentioned earlier) because a something wicked hovered the globe. And as a main character, he's not your average naive hero, but the mischeivous yet chivalrous type... I think we've seen this more than a couple of times in the anime and manga world *coughNarutocough*. Again, as usual, such titles and a children's show requires the bad guy and the bad guy is the Boogeyman aka Pitch Black who I assume is probably one of Loki's minion (and they look similar). Pitch had mastered one of the epic Guardians' dreamcasting power and he plans to psychologically mindraep the kids.

Once more, good vs evil stuff blablabla nothing wrong with that. This time we have something extra like wanting to be noticed, acceptance, teamwork, trust, and how to give joy to kids. Skipping all the spoilers, the good guys win yet again...

...and I end up feeling sorry for Pitch Black...

i know you lot has a crush on Jack Frost, but I'm gonna side the Boogeyman. I mean, I can so totally relate because... I wear black everyday pfft-

[WARNING: Spoilers]

"You want to be left alone? Then BE ALONE!" - Pitch Black to Jack Frost. This quote hits home, man.

Pitch Black is, like Jack Frost, not acknowledged and thus people cannot see them. Perhaps it was due to their negative nature, that people would rather believe in some people who'd reward them with joy. Jack Frost centre was 'fun', so he had been living for so long, unnoticed yet he tries to play with kids as a winter spirit. Being a lot younger than Pitch Black (it seems), he didn't get to experience how'd lonely it is to be invisible. I guess since the Boogeyman is sick of being isolated, he takes his evil to a larger scale. Another case of misunderstood villain.

When Pitch confronted Jack, about forming a tag team, personally I look forward to "cold and dark" combo. But I guess Jack wasn't interested, so I'll just make it my headcanon. And whatever Pitch did seems like he was craving for attention; "LET'S MAKE KIDS BELIEVE IN FEAR!!". I guess he's frustrated that he cannot bring positive things to little kids.

y-yamete kudasai!!

What I expected was, the good guys... well, being GOOD GUYS, would give him a second chance. Yes, I know fear and despair are not meant for kids, but I think it's good for them to understand those. Perhaps as a preperation to the adult world? And this too raises a question; till what age would the children believe in the guardians?

The good guys could've befriended Pitch and allow him to use his powers at minimum. Surely when he's accepted, he wouldn't try to take over the world anymore. I think he only needed friends. It's common to see bad-guys-turn-good in anime/manga but I guess the western kids' show didn't dare to do this just yet. I also mentioned in the previous blogpost, KR Fourze has an interesting and unique way to beat the villain - and it really changed my views on how to deal with antagonists (ideally lol).

[spoiler ends]

And then we also have this clip...

Which totally reminds you of this particular Bunny. Oh great now I know TWO tsundere Bunnies XD

Review: Steins; Gate

Since I heard that this anime was good, I decided to try it out. At first I was reluctant because it was based on a visual novel. Note that I usually find VN or Light Novel adaptations rather dull.

Studio: White Fox

Also note that, though I am a science student, I am not a fan of science fiction... especially when it comes to time travel. You know, being fed with logic makes you think time travel stories are shit, no matter how good they are, and I have no guilt concluding that before even watching/reading them (no offense to Dr. Who fans). And it was all DragonBall's fault, really.

Then Stein;Gate brings science fiction to a whole another level, and this, is so far the only and the BEST time travel themed story I've ever seen. And the theories used made me forget that S;G was really an adaptation of a dating sim game although it's clear that there are girls who are after the main guy, Okabe Rintarou (codename: Hououin Kyoma). If I want to mention who the harem girls are; then you have one genius who's a mild tsundere, one derp girl for a childhood friend, one not-so-epic trap, one idiotically loyal yandere, a moe-moe maid ojou-sama and... John Titor...

John Titor also makes a cameo. Instead of IBM we have IBN, instead of CERN we have SERN.

i remember doing this in the microprocessor lab....

So the story is about an aspiring mad scientist, who apparently isn't going to school or perhaps he was on a summer break, and he has a Future Gadget Lab which is basically just a rented apartment. His lab partner is Daru, the programmer/hacker guy... and for some stupid reason he recruited the derp childhood friend. Thanks to her derp-ness, Kyoma found a way to practically time travel. And seriously this made me smile like an idiot whenever I'm holding my phone in front of the microwave. And we also can joke about irl conspiracy theories with D-mail. Owait, what is a D-mail? Oh it's just a text message we can send to the past in order to change history... it's common in time travel stories, desu ne? But there's something else in S;G that makes this history change not really a change. 

Anyway, thanks to his discovery SERN decided to hunt him down. Before that there was a lot of past changing stuff, which is rather touching in some cases. And sometimes annoying and frustrating. But I gotta tell you that there are a lot of plot twist, which I think makes the story even more intriguing.

However, suddenly the ending looks like just another typical time travel thing... maybe it's the stuff about avoiding peril in the future kind of problem. Well, if that's just easy then why not time travel to prevent all these wars and massacre from happening?

Yet that doesn't change my mind about how good the anime is.

i love being a physicist XD

oh man this is just another lame review huh....

Review: Kamen Rider Fourze

There is a movie I would like to review, but I figured that I should review this one first.

I've never been a Kamen Rider fan, then deady forced me to watch Fourze. so I was like.... okay I'll just give it a shot.

First 10 or 20 episodes annoyed me a lot, because the Kamen Rider dude, Kisaragi Gentarou is too naive and too idealistic. But it got better when the rival, aka the second rider (Kamen Rider Meteor/Ryusei) comes in, because he has the 'darkness within'.

Kamen Rider Fourze is set in high school and the theme is SPACE, and the villains are the astrogoligal signs (Scorpio, Pisces, Aquarius etc). Most of the characters attend Amanogawa High School, which I think was meant for kids to win free tickets to become astronauts. But then there's an ulterior motives behind the existence of the school, of which you should see it for yourself why. And more importantly, rather than space... the real main theme of this show is...

~FRIENDSHIP~

Now I'm not gonna bother summarizing everything, cos it's a 48 episodes show. Too much to rant about. Basically it's the same ol good vs evil thing. And since it's about friendship, most of the time you deal with how to make friends; how socially awkward, freaks and popular kids can form a gang (they have the Kamen Rider Club), and also how you'd deal with backstabbers and power hungry adults. Each of the characters and villains, as well as their minions have their own unique backstory. Gentarou would always be there to fix your problems (and in the end we don't know his very own backstory). Gentarou is like the prophet of friendship-ism, as he did not care what kind of people he befriends. His goal is to make 1000 number of friends. The more antisocial you are the more attracted he is to you, apparently. He doesn't care if you're annoyed with him, he meddles, but that's just him. Sometimes I wonder if he's realy human cos he's all genki and optimistic. It's damn difficult to see him sad and depressed.

We all could wish to have Gentarou as a bff. But rather than thinking that way, why not adapt Gentarou's attitude? :3

Speaking of good vs evil, Fourze has an interesting way to defeat the final boss. And I really mean it. I think it was touching, and not every kid's show dare doing this.

As one of the characters said, "do not hate [the villain], pity him instead". And yeah he has a point. So here's a little bit of spoiler:
Instead of revenge the kids all thanked the final boss for giving them a wonderful school life, while Fourze beat the crap out of him. And no not sarcastically. They were very honest. In the end the final boss softened... because, of course, the bad guy is not that evil after all!

I am also aware that the recent Kamen Riders would have a lot of power ups around their belt. However Fourze's switches look rather childish that it's hard to take seriously. And how do you scientifically create/invent the switches anyway? Uh... I guess I shouldn't ask much knowing Utahoshi Kengo's... true identity.

it's a tap!!

When I watched the first ten episodes I thought, yeah, this show really is for kids.
But then, I kinda wished that this show existed like 10 years ago, as I think back then i really need to understand the true meaning of friendship. Since I can't turn back time, well, I think this will be one of the shows I would show to my future vienspawns, or maybe young apprentices.

Tthe great thing about this show is that you don't have to bother about romance much. While there are a few hints about love, but the POWER OF FRIENDSHIP conquers everything.

You'd also learn that you shouldn't entirely hate the 'bad guy'. There must be a reason he's causing chaos and all. He probably lost sight of himself, or other people. Sometimes the adults need younger people to remind them of what they used to be, and what went wrong with them. Ah well, I think adults should watch this too. Again, yeah I think it's too idealistic even for a fictional show but hey... we need good examples for our lives.

Happy Graduation Day! Thank you for the entertaining show!