Sky Crawlers doesn’t really sound like a aerial dogfight-y kinda title to me. It makes me think of flying spiders or something. But what’s in a name, anyway?

From the beginning of Sky Crawlers, it’s apparent there is something weird going on with the world. There are pilots in the sky shooting down enemies, being shot down, and being replaced. But the pilots don’t seem as though they’re really that into the war. There’s not a crazy lengthy backstory to which side is which (one of the reasons I can’t watch Gundam, too much backstory). Instead, it’s nameless side versus also nameless side.

The pacing of Sky Crawlers is really slow. Some parts of the film were excruciatingly slow. I fast forwarded the beginning credits and there were parts of the movie I seriously could’ve watched in 1.5x speed. I’m convinced it has to do with the aesthetics of Japanese cinema.

It would be deceptive to label this with the genre “action” or “war.” It’s more about the characters. At its core is a drama with war and aerial dog fighting as the setting. As the story progresses (slowly), we learn more about the world the characters are living in, their own circumstances, and the world view that is quite different from our own, though not completely foreign. I wouldn’t want to give too much away, but I think the story is definitely affected by post-war Japan’s pacifist movement and is a criticism of war and its modern day television production values. In other words, a criticism of war television as entertainment.

I must’ve read this or heard this idea somewhere, that while Western cinema really focuses on “the good guy won in the end” kind of story, Japanese cinema goes for “the protagonist accomplished something, or grew, or something.” In other words, it’s about winning the war (Western) versus character growth (Japanese). Not that these two are mutually exclusive, but you’ll see a lot more dead protagonists and “bad endings” in Japanese movies. Ummm… don’t consider that a spoiler or anything…

Overall, I liked Sky Crawlers. I think it suffered from a really slow pace (again, aesthetics), incredibly generic character designs (except for the hookers) and sloppy visual coordination (I still hate CG paired with hand-drawn cels + painted backgrounds? And the hand-drawn animation seemed really low-framerate for a feature film). I think the story could’ve used a bit more tact too (some parts seemed super preachy but were necessary for exposition). Despite all these shortcomings, I enjoyed the movie and it made me think, at the very least. At least they try to turn the thing into a Hollywood action film or anything.

One more thing. At the very beginning, I groaned because the CG elements made the film look more like the cutscenes to a video game. Later on in the movie, a character refers to their situation as a sort of game. I wonder, then, if the comparison I made about the similarity of the fight scenes and the “war as a game” theme were not a coincidence, but an intended juxtaposition. Probably not; I think the Japanese just have a thing for crappy CG in their anime.

Thanks to Sony Pictures Home Entertainment for sending me an advance review copy of The Sky Crawlers（スカイ・クロラ）. It’s out on May 26th.

Evangelion Calendar

This one’s kind of interesting. It’s an app that will generate an image that you can use as your iPhone’s wallpaper. It basically takes one of 12 images and you can overlay a calendar on it. It’s pretty limited because you can’t add more images. The images are not really that interesting. Have I mentioned I’ve never seen Evangelion? Anyway, if you’re a fan I guess it’s cool. The app makes the calendar based on the month and year, though it only goes up to December 2013 (which is one year longer than it needs to be, apparently). Pretty cool if you don’t already have a calendar makin’ app and you like the images (though rotating through them might ultimately become kinda stale).

Evangelion Puzzle

This is just the slidey puzzle game that I’m not very good at, times 9. But you have to unlock the current puzzle to get the next image. I’m pretty sure there’s some kind of algorithm for going through these puzzles if you know which square goes where. But I’m too lazy to figure it out because solving the puzzle is ultimately not very fun. You can choose between easy, medium and hard difficulty (probably determines how effed up the computer scrambles your puzzle) and 3×3, 4×4 and 5×5 grids. It’s pretty easy to get through them all on easy 3×3 mode!

So that’s about it! As an iPhone developer, I can say that the apps work pretty well. They don’t crash randomly, which is hard to accomplish in Objective-C! The premise of all these Evangelion-themed apps is kinda funny. They could literally make anything based on the franchise. I kind of expect to see an Evangelion Farts app next. Anyway, thanks to Appliya for sending me the apps. Go to their website for more info on the first 5 apps they’ve made so far.

This 6th volume of Love Com was a bit dissapointing, for the fact that very few names were called. Sure, there was plenty of “shrimp” thrown out there, but that’s Risa’s main attack. Otani threw a “Gigantosaurus” out there, but that was mainly it.

So let’s see… What happened in this volume? Oh, that’s right. Otani accidentally kissed Risa, then forgot about the whole thing because he was sick. It’s funny because they even mention this as “The Blackout Defense!” Then Risa steals a kiss from Otani, but immediately quits him. This comes off as only slightly implausible (because women are naturally illogical).

Enter Mighty-sensei. I was actually kind of surprised that Risa was loyal to Otani for a little while after Mighty showed up. It’s only after Otani told Risa about the whole grain of rice thing that Risa went over the edge. The whole Mighty arc for me is a bit boring. Mighty is sort of the voice of reason during the whole episode. He realizes that Otani likes Risa and he knowingly messes with the kids to get them together. I could imagine his plan backfiring pretty badly though, getting him into a tough teacher/student situation (isn’t that what doujinshi is for?).

At the end of the volume, Otani’s Mighty jealousy finally takes over and he grabs Risa from the ero-teacher. Good job! Now what? Oh, that’s what the next volume is for. For the sake of continuing the series, probably more hesitation from both parties.

Thoughts? This volume was also a bit too emo. At least they kissed though. Twice! Does that mean Risa’s going to make a baby!? There was also distressingly little Chiharu-chan. So disappointing.

I got the second volume of Honey and Clover (along with some Love*Com) at the library a few weeks ago and I finally read the H&C. So here’s a quick review (mostly to remind me of what happened once I decide to read volume 3).

This volume was mostly a character-building one. We learn about Takemoto’s mom and his stepdad. And how he hates going back home because of him. There’s not much in the way of Morita backstory. He stays a mystery for a while. Mayama is outed in this volume as a stalker of sorts. But he gets a good job away from Rika. Oh, and we learn about how Hagu moved away from the country to experience cool stuff so she can paint it.

This volume is notable because it contains a lot of the quintessential Honey & Clover scenes. Like the one where Hagu looks at the giraffe and sorta memorizes it so she can paint it later. Actually, I dunno if that’s a really famous scene. But I liked it. Also, the part where Mayama carries Yamada and she confesses her love to him is in this volume. So sweet. Oh and the part where all the kids look for the four leaf clover to give to Shuu is here, too. Natsukashii!

I like reading Honey & Clover. It’s pretty dramatic and I enjoy that. It makes me want to make my life more dramatic as well! Maybe I should just settle for reading about it though. My feeling is that the narrative is a bit random. Like there’s no driving plot behind anything. Just a pair of love triangles. But I suppose that’s good enough for now.

Um. Thanks, AADL for letting me borrow Honey & Clover Volume 2.

It looks like Round Table is at it again with a new album after their single, Koi wo Shiteru. I haven’t really been watching anime so I haven’t been picking up on their anime OP/ED or anything. I guess they did the one for Yozakura Quartet.

It feels like Round Table is sorta running into that Ali Project thing where all their songs are starting to sound the same. It’s not as bad, but I think they have a couple of song “templates” that all run into each other. I’m listening to the album right now and it’s like, “did I accidentally switch to April?” For example, “Atashi Datte Onaji Koto Omotte” sounds like “symphony,” which also sounds like “Stay With Me” which also sounds like “Where is Love.” Some parts of “Nagareboshi” sound copied and pasted from “puzzle!” Seriously.

I’m not sure what the solution is here, since you can’t just ask Round Table to stop sounding like Round Table (and Nino). Maybe they just need some new blood? Round Table Feat. Nino and X?

Maria+Holic

Is this some kind of crossover between Maria-sama ga Miteiru and xxxHolic!? It has a maid and a girl with an eye mole who may or may not be voiced by Hirano Aya. Is she even popular anymore? Looks like it’ll be a bore!

Sora wo Kakeru Shoujo

There must be a motif in Japanese about girls leaping through things. Time, the sky, etc. Also, I looked at the JDict entry for “kakeru” and there’s like a million uses for the verb! I’m familiar with the use of “kakeru” as casting some kind of spell (mahou wo kakete). Anyway, this anime involves space, which usually means I probably won’t watch it. Not that I’ve had time to watch anything while in grad school…

VIPER’S CREED

This looks like the badass series of the season. What with the all-caps treatment of the title and tough dude and CG Mech things.

Asu no Yoichi

If this series has any level of fanservice, I expect jpmeyer to make the following comment:

Asu no Yoichi? More like Assu no Yoichi!

Kurokami

This one already got licensed. What the hey!?

Kemono no Souja Erin

This one has some characters in tunics. Boring!

Chrome Shelled Regios

Sounds like some kind of breakfast cereal.

RIDE BACK

Hot girl on a bike/robot. Seems like a winner to me!

SakuranBOY DT

This looks like a gag show. I’d totally watch the first episode since I like dumb/weird comedy.

Hetalia Axis Powers

Is this like Mao-chan except with boys? Or maybe they’re big and just super deformed on the website. Oh well. Whatever.

I dunno how I missed this but it looks like Broccoli Books USA is closing shop. This is really depressing and makes me wish I had reviewed more of the stuff they sent me. I thought Broccoli always did the best job with their books (super heavy quality paper, sometimes too heavy!) and artbooks. Plus they did a lot of Disgaea stuff!

My thoughts are with all those affected by the closure, including main PR person (and other stuff person) Shizuki who was always so nice and responsive to my emails. Best of luck to you in the future!

Mao-chan is the other, other Akamatsu Ken property that sort of comes after the popularity of Love Hina and Negima. And I think there’s a reason it’s not as popular…

Book Blurb:
Japan has been invaded by aliens–but this is no ordinary assault. These extraterrestrials are cute and extremely dangerous. Their mind-blowing powers are way too much for the military. Enter Mao-chan, the daughter of a great general, and her charming best friends–Japan’s only hope against this massive attack of the adorables!

Review:
Mao-chan basically consists of one joke: cute aliens are stealing Japanese so cute girls are needed to fight them, cutely. Because if Japan was to use a nuke against a cute alien, it’d be totally uncool. Mao and friends fight against the alien threat and seem to endure mostly on luck. Their super complicated weapons never really do the job; Mao is too clumsy to make the triangle of destruction work. Rather, bonking the aliens on the head (cutely) is the preferred method of neutralizing the threat.

Throughout the manga, there are some fairly cute and sentimental moments. Unfortunately they’re all incredibly cliche by now. Perhaps they weren’t when the manga was originally released in 2003. Stories about girls becoming BFF or klutzy girls running away from the school athletic festival or girls without moms celebrating Christmas feel really manufactured. Maybe it’s just my own familiarity of the source material, but it just doesn’t feel like there’s any substance to the stories. Even when something interesting happens, it’s within the narrow confines of the restrictive “something cute happens, aliens appear, Mao screws up but saves the day anyway” plot.

The last two chapters kinda made up for the rest of the book with an epic Freudian moment of a girl resuscitating her alien pal by blowing air into him. The money line is “Am I seeing things are is he starting to plump up?” You cannot make this stuff up.

Along with the “All grown up” bonus chapter at the end, I guess Mao-chan can be interesting. But for the most part it’s really formulaic.

It also seems as though many of the side characters aren’t getting the exposure they should to make the story actually interesting. The three kids get too much spotlight. Plus they’re kind of boring once you get past their token traits. I kinda got confused when they threw other generic kids into the mix because I couldn’t tell Mao apart from them.

Overall, I guess I’d only recommend Mao-chan if you really liked the anime. I think the stories in the manga are original. Even if you like Akamatsu Ken, it’s his work only in character design.

Thanks to Del Rey Manga for sending me a review copy of Mao-Chan Volume 1!

It’s the third birthday of the beginning of my anime blog(, and the month and a halfiversary of its death?)! Seriously, I have been kept pretty busy by school, work and trying to find a job (which I did, with Microsoft!).

Hopefully the next year will bring more free time, and more time to actually write about anime and manga and other stuff!

Tanoshimi ni!

Also, I think that the above picture resembles the kind that lonely otaku sit in front of while having birthdays by themselves. How appropriate for a deserted blog!

So what’s the deal with anime and manga products getting bigger and bigger? I mean, who are the ad wizards who came up with that one? </end Seinfeld reference>

Anyway, I’ve noticed that anime is getting packaged in larger and larger sets (like the half-season sets and full season sets from Funimation) along with some new giant manga volumes (like the Mao-chan I just got from Del Rey that’s like 380 pages!).

I wonder what this is a response to. The previous method of releasing series very, very slowly (I remember Jeff Lawson’s post about how Full Moon wo Sagashite would take for-e-ver) might not have paid off for distributors. So instead, they’re slamming fans with lots of a series off the bat. Maybe it just makes sense for companies with a trillion licences too (like Funimation and Del Rey, the two companies I referenced).

Is it better or worse for fans? The whole slow release thing just doesn’t make sense in the world of digital downloads anyway, so this is probably a response. I’m sure jpmeyer would be able to give a good explanation of this (he probably has already). Just thought I’d mention this since I noticed a trend appearing with the appearance of giant-sized manga as well.