Winter 2012 Anime Season: Back in the Saddle!?

Published by Hung on January 15, 2012 in Anime and Preview. 1 Comment

I’ve taken some time out of my busy Skyrim playing schedule to watch a bunch of the 2012 Winter anime. So far I’ve seen High School DxD, Moretsu Pirates, Nisemonogatari, Papa no blah blah blah Ikinasai, Recorder and Little Kid, Kill Me Baby and Amagami SS+. Oh, and the one about the round cat.

The last anime I watched in its entirety was Madoka, which I thought was pretty good, despite the annoying finish. I’d like to watch more new anime, but I also don’t want to get suckered into watching bad shows. If anyone has suggestions on last season’s series that were good, lemme know.

Here’s some random thoughts on this season’s anime thus far:

High School DxD

Sorry girls, but you're all way too ugly.


Did the censorship practices for anime change severely since the last time I watched? Back in my day we’d see steam/lens flares and we’d like it! While there is something to be said for holding things back, I think probably the only reason anyone is watching this show past episode 1 is the fanservice. I thought the animation was pretty low quality, but you can always compensate with nips.

Moretsu Pirates

My Mother the Pirate


Of all the shows I’ve watched thus far, Moretsu Pirates has some potential. I haven’t watched the second episode yet, but I have a feeling this could be interesting enough to keep my attention. The animation is solid and there’s a “cool meganekko” which can’t hurt. Also, hot pirate mom.

Nisemonogatari
I was really puzzled by this one. Then I realized it was a sequel to Bakemonogatari. I figured it started “in medias res” so it should be slightly confusing. I didn’t realize I was watching it “in medias in medias res.” INCEPTION.

Just Do What Papa Says!

Where's Chris Hansen when you need him?


At first I thought this was a heartwarming anime about a college student finding his true self, and a couple trying to find family with their mixed parent kids. Then the college student got babysitting duties for his unrelated nieces who want to bone him. Wah wah. While I like some characters (the big boobed senpai who seems to be some kind of performance artist), most of them are pretty messed up. This show could be interesting to watch for its awkwardness, but part of me really doesn’t want this thing on my hard drive at all.

Kill Me Baby

Aside from having the worst OP in the history of OPs, Kill Me Baby is actually pretty good. I lol’ed at the part where dumb girl eats the crepe instead of distracting the bear with it. Also, the Engrish “Kirru me, bebe” is pretty hilarious. I think this show could get old fast, given the low number of characters, but whatever. Maybe I’ll watch it until it bores me.

Amagami SS Plus

Cut and paste various scenes to get the hidden Miyu arc!


Amagami was a rare anime that I actually finished watching, so it totally makes sense for me to watch this followup. I was hoping they’d do something crazy like have Junichi (is that his name?) date ALL of the girls at once and come up with the compromise that they all need him, and he needs all of them. Instead they’re just starting where they left off in each girl’s arc. So far I watched the first two episodes. It’s nice to see the characters in a somewhat stable relationship instead of fumbling around and having misunderstandings all the time. There isn’t much tension to provide though, since we already know they live happily ever after. Hopefully this means they will just load up on Morishima fanservice.

Round Cat is Round

Girls love round cats


A drunken office lady finds a round cat. That’s about it. It’s only 3 minutes, so why not watch?

Recorder and Lando Calrissian

This show is only 3 minutes long as well. But it’s also stupid as hell and I’m not going to watch it.

So that’s it for my current season views. If you have any suggestions, please hit me up in the comments!

Madoka Magica 10: Groundhog Day

Published by Hung on March 11, 2011 in Anime and Episodic. 12 Comments Tags: .

RIP Mami... again

After last week’s sorta meh episode, we get another Madoka of awesomeness! This time, we get to see how Homura came to be a mahou shoujo. Apparently in the original timeline, Mami and Madoka became partners (since Homura wasn’t there to delay Madoka becoming a Meguka, which probably led to a Madoka/Mami assist on the candy monster). They saved Homura and she became their magical girl toadie.

The original Walpurgis Night giant witch thing ended up killing Mami and Madoka and Homura made a contract to go back in time to make things right, just like in Quantum Leap! Homura then goes through a series of resets, trying to save her friend Madoka from what seems like the inevitable: becoming a witch and possibly destroying the Earth!

Homura 1.0

It’s really cool to see how Homura used to be the most awkward of everyone, and conversely, Madoka seemed the coolest. Through perhaps years of battling witches, Homura mastered the art of using concealed weapons (her shield is a bag of holding?) to become the most badass magical girl ever. A magical girl who uses guns? Fuck yeah! And man, does she clean up well (though I kinda like her with twintails and glasses…)!

This seems to happen a lot.

It was interesting to see the reactions of the characters in other situations too, like when Sayaka the witch was defeated and Mami went all apeshit, killing all the other magical girls so they wouldn’t turn into witches themselves. I was kinda hoping for a Kyubei death montage, sort of like Bill Murray’s montage of suicides in Groundhog Day.

Cool magical girls don't look at explosions

Homura’s actions finally make sense now, given the fact that she’s lost her friends multiple times. She calls Madoka by her first name because they’re BFF and acts cool because Madoka said she should. Basically everything she does is for Madoka, her first friend. She just has to convince her not to make a contract. It doesn’t seem too difficult, given that she could just sit them down with Kyubei and have him explain the contract legalese at length? Kyubei really doesn’t seem to be averse to telling the truth; he just leaves a lot out.

The series looks like it’s leading to a pretty finale. I can’t wait to see what happens next!

Madoka Magica needs more yuri moments like this!

Madoka Magica 8: Tastes Like Kyubei!

Published by Hung on February 25, 2011 in Anime and Episodic. 6 Comments Tags: .

OMG. This was a great episode of Madoka Magica. Basically all of the speculation of the previous 7 episodes led up to the events of this one. If you don’t want to be spoiled, you should probably stop reading.

First off, Kyubei is soooo evil! Or at the very least, very manipulative. It all makes sense now! Kyubei turns girls into witches, the girls hunt the witches and get energy but eventually lose it and become witches themselves. The witches kill humans to get energy and are killed by the magical girls. Kyubei profits!! Also, Kyubei eats his own corpse, probably to conserve energy. Just like a cat!

If you were a Kyubei and you were starving, would you eat yourself?

Next, it seems Homura really is a time traveler! Or maybe a dimensional traveler. She finally stops pretending to be cool and actually pleads with Madoka to take better care of herself (e.g. stop trying to become Meguca). It’s obvious she knows what’s going to happen. She kinda lazily tried to save Sayaka but knew it was useless (Sayaka totally saw through her poker face). Also, the shotgun blast to Kyubei was sweet, but it’s too bad his death wasn’t permanent like Mami’s was.

Of course Sayaka goes off the deep end and lets her soul gem thingy get too tainted and becomes a witch. Watching this series keeps reminding me of that quote from The Dark Knight: “You either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain.”

I really like Homura as a character as things are revealed. She knew that trying to save Mami was impossible, though she wanted to anyway. She knew Sayaka was going to turn into a witch the whole time, yet she couldn’t do anything to stop that either. After being aloof stopped working, she finally broke down and pleaded with Madoka. There’s a lot to her character that’s not stated.

I thought of a good way to end the show. Madoka can just make her wish that Kyubei stop making girls into magical girls! Problem solved. It probably won’t be that simple though. More realistically, Madoka will probably become a magical girl and become God. Then she might make the world explode or something. Who knows? She’s like the Luke Skywalker of this show.

Alright, that’s enough speculation. I just gotta wait until the next episode. Apparently this show is only 12 episodes long, so who knows if Madoka will even get to become a magical girl?

Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica Episode 7

Published by Hung on February 18, 2011 in Anime and Episodic. 5 Comments Tags: .

Just finished watching the latest Madoka Magica. The series has definitely outdone my expectations (which were kind of low to begin with). This was a pretty good episode for character development. We get to learn why the spear girl is a loner and get confirmation that wishes really end up backfiring (or just evening things out).

The whole apple biting thing kinda reminded me of Iron Chef’s Takeshi Kaga:

In other news, it looks like Sayaka is mega pissed that she’s a zombie and can’t really be with her boyfriend. I wonder if being a shell of a human prevents her from that much or if she’s just being dramatic. By the end of the episode it’s apparent that she’s flipped and is headed toward the dark side pretty quickly.

Oh, and it’s episode 7 and Madoka is not Magica yet. How many episodes is this show, anyway? If it’s 12 or 13 then I feel kind of cheated. The beginning credits sequence is so not canon now, what with Mami dead and the show definitely not as lighthearted as it was made out to be. It’s kinda funny that they haven’t changed the OP or anything to match the show’s darkness. The ED works for that though, I guess.

It’s pretty late at night so this blog post most likely is rambling, but I figured I’d just pound it out before I forget!

Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica 5

Published by Hung on February 6, 2011 in Anime and Episodic. 0 Comments Tags: .

Seku-hara!

Alrighty, so that Sayaka girl made a wish and went through the magical girl commencement ceremony of a quick grope from Kyubey. Then she seems to act all high and mighty because her boyfriend got cured (but why not just ask for the whole shebang? Hello, he might want legs!) and she’s all super powerful and stuff. She really seems to be gloating at Madoka, so I hope she gets her downfall pretty soon.

I wish for my boyfriend to be able to play Ave Maria with or without actually playing his violin!

Oh, and there’s a new magical girl in town who wants to start stuff and attacks Sayaka. She looks to be the type to make a whole bunch of grief seeds and then quit that crazy scene. She points out that magical girls need grief seeds, which are made of witches, which are made of familiars, which are made of human (and kitten) tears. So basically magical girls are worse than your gas guzzling Hummer (which are fueled directly from kitten tears).

Almost NSFW

It feels like the animation budget went downhill on this episode. Was it just me or did they reuse an attack animation twice in the same episode? The ending was pretty sweet though, with a possible three-way magical girl fight (three girls one Kyubey?)!

And here’s my random conspiracy theory: Homura is actually Mami back from the dead (and the future) as Madoka’s wish to become a magical girl is to bring her back. Crazy? Yes. But stranger things have happened on Lost!

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