Kimiko_0's Anime
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| Lagrange - The Flower of Rin-ne (TV 2) | Decent | I'm starting to notice the blue/red fringing a lot now. It's in both seasons, the OVA and the specials. Apparently it was intentional, but I'd rather they didn't use this effect. It just looks bad. This 'season' continues the story. We're finally getting a little more background on why the two factions are fighting over the Voxes, but the history is as confusing as ever. Ep.19's conclusion of the fighting is rather anticlimactic. "Why were we fighting?" :/ And everyone promises to live happily ever after. Which means there's only five eps. left to build up and conclude the final arc :/ Well, at least it seems to have proper foreshadowing. Well, the ending was better than I expected. A lot of fireworks in the climax, then a goofy epilogue. There was still a lot not properly explained, but it wasn't bad. Overall though, my opinion hasn't really changed since season one. This anime had a lot of potential which it didn't really fulfill, and it keeps switching between action and slice-of-life without really giving either enough time. It wasn't a waste though, and enjoyable. |
| Laid-Back Camp (TV) | Excellent | Iyashikei. Looks somewhat like YamaSusu? It's going to get a second season, a season of short eps. and a movie, so I'm not sure if I should wait until it's complete. Eh, let's watch it now. Camping in November? *shiver* Too cold ︴>﹏<︴ Aw, it's over. Too soon :( I want to see more YuruKyan ^_^ Second time watching: Nadeshiko&Rin are a really cute couple. Both are constantly thinking of the other, and Nadeshiko is the only person Rin doesn't resist hanging out with and instead just makes part of her life. They're also the first to call eachother by first name, even if later the whole group does that. The third special ("SabaCamp") feels a bit out of place. |
| Laid-Back Camp (TV 2) | Very good | More YuruCamp ^_^ Seems the BDs aren't finished releasing so the good subs will have to wait. Couldn't resist watching it now though. Ep.1 starts with a flashback to little Rin's first camping trip. Ep.13 ends with the scene from the ED. The extras are very extra this time. I liked the ones from S1 better. Overall though it's another lovely season of YuruCamp ^_^ |
| Land of the Lustrous (TV) | Decent | Leah seemed to be interested, and it's getting good reviews so far. The first ep. looked a bit melancholy. It's probably the empty environment. The eps. feel shorter than the normal runlength. Maybe that's a good sign? The story is intriguing at least, even if it feels a little "how do we make characters like this and an otherwise empty world plausible". Oh, come on, that must be one of the most egregious instances of laser-guided amnesia ever, in ep.6. Phos loses her legs, which hold some of her memories. How convenient that precisely her adventure during which she learned some important information was memorized in her legs, and.. wait, half of that adventure took place after she lost her legs, so that should be memorized in some other part of her body. It doesn't even make sense. This anime is also giving me a slight post-Madoka magical girl vibe, like making characters suffer just because that's what sells (to some odious part of fandom). And finished, for now. This is clearly just the first half (or so) of a longer series. There isn't even any pseudo-resolution or cliffhanger, it just ends. So far it's been interesting, but not super great. Mostly it's the characters not really getting much depth and the world being so lifeless. |
| Last Exile (TV) | Decent | Wow, someone must've been a fan of Ghibli's Laputa. Heavy on the CGI. Let's hope they don't pull bad tricks to compensate. And the character designs are very reminiscent of Yoshitoshi Abe. Not surprising, considering that this anime shares several animation directors with Lain and Haibane Renmei. Hmm, it looks like they've brought their predilection for blurriness and muddy colors along too. It's not as bad as Boogiepop Phantom was, but vividness and clarity are not these animators' strong points. Well, the last few eps. were kinda meh after that big battle. And now we get a love triangle? :/ Worse, it looks like it's turning into a harem/romantic drama :( I liked it better when it was still just a political/military intrigue. Wow, from high-ranked officer to princess to distressed damsel. Way to derail your characters. Okay, after those middle eps. it does get better again, but my main complaint is that Claus gets treated as the great hero by everyone all the time without actually doing much at all to deserve that kind of attention (he's pretty boring really). Meanwhile more interesting characters only get to be support for him. The story is a bit uneven, especially at the end. All of ep.25 is spent on Claus, Al and Lavie travelling with not much else happening, then the whole rest of the story has to be crammed into ep.26. And kinda suffers in clarity as a result. Overall, not a waste of time, but also not worth watching more than once. |
| Leave it to Kero! Theatrical Version (movie) | Decent | See CardCaptor Sakura |
| Legend of Mana: The Teardrop Crystal (TV) | Good | From the title and logo it's going to be the Jumi storyline from the game. Male MC probably though :/ Decided to watch this weekly, just watched ep.1. Male MC indeed, though the female MC is shown in the OP, so maybe she comes along later? I hope so. The first ep. covered just the intro to Domina and opening of Mekiv Caverns, although some events already happened before. Elazul is named that despite his JP name being different, but Lisa is named Corona here for some reason. Other names so far seem to be the same, though I don't think the MC was named in the game. Ep.2 finishes the Lots Princess event, giving Pearl some screentime with the MC, and making the MC & Elazul unable to finish off Du'Inke, requiring a stealth appearance from Lady Blackpearl. The former was nice, the latter I'm not really convinced was necessary. The second half was pretty slow though, mostly the Jumi legend(s?) and setup for the Flame Of Hope event. Curiously Boyd and MC seemed to know about the Gato Grottoes before the Flame artifact was used, contrary to ep.1 where they suddenly remembered the Mekiv Caverns. I'm guessing this anime will go through all of the Jumi-related events, but go off that track at some point to add more story and character background. Gato Grottoes (Flame Of Hope) in ep.3, Polpota Harbor (Drowned Dreams) in ep.4 and Tower Of Leires (Looking-Glass Tower) in ep.5.They added Sappho's background to ep.4, and in ep.5 the excuse for Shiloh to go to Leires was that his sword was broken in the fight with Sandra. He's pretty weak compared to the game. Seraphina showed up in all three, first meeting Shiloh in Gato, then saving him from Sandra in Polpota, and finally nursing him back from a fever at Home before he goes to get his sword fixed. Curiously, it's implied that he knew Watts and Pokiehl before, even though in ep.1 it's said that he never travelled outside Domina before. There wasn't much interaction at the top of Leires between Blackpearl and Pearl unfortunately. In ep.6 they altered the script quite a bit, with Seraphina being a student at the Magic Academy, and Esmeralda leaving Geo later on. After a sidetrip in ep.7 to Madora Beach for the Summer Lovin' and Where's Putty? events the anime goes back to the game's script with Esmeralda's core being taken by Sandra in Geo. It seems we'll be going through the remaining Jumi quests now. Ep.8 covers Cosmo and the start of Two Pearls, with only Elazul's Sword Of Fate being referenced as extra. Shiloh and Elazul keep on being shown as weaklings against Sandra and even regular enemies. At least Lady Blackpearl looks badass ^_^ The ending is kinda meh. Suddenly it's revealed that Seraphina has been raised by Sandra and is cooperating with her, without any clues beforehand. It makes Shiloh's feeling of betrayal relatable, but it's too much of a last-minute swerve to feel true. Worse, she enters holding Blackpearl's core. Not only did the most badass character get killed (unlike in the original), she even gets killed off-screen. Then we get some battling where Shiloh is again total weaksauce. Elazul, near death, offers his own core to complete the Lord Of Jewels's collection, but bafflingly Sandra instead tears out her own undamaged core to offer it. That made sense in the game where Sandra is desperate after being defeated, but it doesn't here. After that Shiloh gets nearly killed and Seraphina & Shiloh both turn to stone. Dramatic, but the moment felt kinda clumsy. Then at the end we return to the original with the Jumi reviving and in turn reviving the two MCs. The director's cut version of ep.12 cut out some flashback at the beginning to add some better battle scenes and a few shots here and there. The story didn't change. Interestingly there were two very short shots of Larc and Escad, for no apparent reason. I guess they wanted to hint at there being more to the LoM world, but they're really to short for that. And with Echoes Of Mana shutting down it seems the Mana franchise will be dead again for a long time. Overall, it's nice that LoM got some attention. Hopefully this anime draws more people to the game. It's mostly really nice to see the story animated, but they should've stuck to the original for the ending. |
| A Letter to Momo (movie) | Very good | Looks like it'll be a nice movie. Is super-flat the current fashion for movies? Aww, that was a lovely movie ^_^ Nothing super deep, just very nice. |
| Library War (TV) | Weak | Yes, the premise is indeed as ridiculous as expected. I hope the rest of this anime is still okay though. Hmm, it's basically a 'lone woman in the military' story. The 'special task force' bit is just an excuse to keep the cast small. Meh. What passes for a plot is so weak it doesn't even make it to the fridge before falling apart. Because of that it's hard to care about the trouble the characters get into. Aside from their job, there's only a vaguely romantic subplot, but that isn't nearly enough to save this anime from mediocrity. |
| (The) Life of Budori Gusuko (movie 2012) | Decent | Another Kenji Miyazawa story, similar cat style as Galactic Railroad and Kenji's Spring. The kids' voices don't quite fit their age I think. The backgrounds are gorgeous, the 3DCG a little less so. Not that it's bad, just not as good as the background art. The adventure is a little Ghibli-esque, though not as exuberant. The ending felt cut short, not showing Budori's fate or why/how that sorceror guy got involved. The dream scenes stuck out as not quite fitting into the story; visually too because they had much more CG. So, overall, it was entertaining, but mostly worth it for the background art. |
| Like the Clouds, Like the Wind (movie) | Decent | Not from Studio Ghibli, but the staff includes several people who also work(ed) there. The animation/art is pretty good, although of course from 1990. The story I found rather thin though. None of the characters get much development, the bad guys' motivation is, non-existent, and the ending is quite unsatisfying. Overall this anime seems more like exercise for the artists than a great movie. |
| Lily C.A.T. (OAV) | Not really good | Eww, a dub. Seems like it can't be helped though. The plot takes a lot of elements from both Alien and The Thing, but the story isn't as scary as either. Maybe it's because I saw those movies when I was much younger? |
| Limit Cycle (movie) | Bad | Part of Genius Party. Philosophical rambling over a video that's more moving stills than animation. Bleh. Who put this crap in? |
| (The) Little Lies We All Tell (TV) | Not really good | The description of one boy as one of the 4 girls got me curious. I'm still expecting some trans joke somewhere, but the first ep. was at least okayish. Going to try ep. 2. Huh, again that could've gone badly, but it didn't. There was even a bit about an apparently straight woman suggesting it'd just be a matter of time until Japan recognizes same-sex marriages. Didn't expect that in a random comedy anime. Oh, ep.3 was fairly meh. Ep.4 has Tsubasa changed into a girl and realizing she actually prefers that. Too bad the status quo of course gets restored. Well, even the ending didn't change much really. This anime had a few moments of potential, but typical of 4-koma manga it chose restoration of the status quo every time. |
| (The) Little Prince and the Eight-Headed Dragon (movie) | Decent | Cited by Katabuchi (of Black Lagoon and Maimai Shinko) as his inspiration to become a director. Interesting to see it. The art is a little rough, but it's a pretty style. And the animation is good too, if a little slow. |
| A Little Snow Fairy Sugar (TV) | Very good | Another nice sweet anime. Some parts of it are a little predictable, but overall, the story is nice and the characters are very likeable. I think I'll buy this. |
| A Little Snow Fairy Sugar Summer Special | Very good | Two extra eps. showing a flashback from four years after the series back to an event that probably took place during the early part of the series. A nice addition. |
| Little Witch Academia (movie) | Very good | Akko is pretty cool ^_^ On one hand I wish it were longer, but on the other hand I'm not sure it could be much longer. The character designs are a little un-anime-like. Is that Yoshinari's style? I'm not sure it's great. It's okay to experiment a little outside the anime standards, but it shouldn't become too western. Second time: Yes, it is Yoshinari's style. He was also involved in Kill La Kill and a bunch of other anime with that same art style. Like I said before, it's not exactly bad, but not really my taste either. |
| Little Witch Academia (TV) | Decent | 25 eps. Netflix's (/HorribleSubs?) TL said to be bad. Ah, I guess this series starts over from when Akko joined Luna Nova. Hmm, 8 eps. in there's still no main plot, only episodic ones. That rich guy looked like he might return sometime, but that's all. Rich guy turned up again in ep.10. I hope we don't see much more of him. Ah, ep.11 is the first one with plot progress. Quite plot-heavy in fact, and from there on it's nearly all plot all the time. The second half introduces a new, obviously evil character. Diana features a little more prominently in the new OP, but rich guy is still present. Well, we'll see where it goes. Eps.19&20 are the first double ep. And Diana is finally shown to be secretly a Chariot fan too. I was wondering when she would start to get a bigger role in the story. Oh, now we even get the old "evil smapho app that turns people into mobs"? I thought the writing was a little unsophisticated now and then (infodumps, deus-ex-machina plot twists, convenient quest-givers), but this is getting unoriginal. Ep.23 is all infodump. It explains the plot twist in ep.22, but doesn't really excuse the lack of foreshadowing. And then it ends with a mix of nonsense, deus-ex-machina and "anything can happen because, whatever, it's magic". Well, that was a little disappointing. It was colorful and actionful of course, the characters were mostly likeable, even if not very deep. The writing though wasn't very good. Overall it's not bad, but not the awesomeness that a lot of people claim it to be. |
| Little Witch Academia: The Enchanted Parade (OAV) | Good | Another fun little adventure of Akko and her friends. No super deep plot, but twice as long as the first movie. From all the English text it's clear that this was made for an international audience. And it's easy to see how Yoshinari/Trigger's USAian-style anime would appeal internationally. I like more Japanese art styles better, but this isn't bad. |
| Living for the Day After Tomorrow (TV) | Very good | The pretty art is almost as good as Aoi Hana's. This could easily have turned into some stupid harem anime or comedy. It's nice to see it taken seriously and told from the girls' perspectives instead. Ahh, that was very beautiful, and touching. Good to know it's licensed already. This is another anime for the to-buy list :) |
| Locodol (TV) | Good | Slice-of-life. Maybe some yuri references (not really sure though). Hmm, I hope it's not going to be very embarrassing. The first ep. didn't draw it out too long at least. Yukari's love for Nanako is a bit strong though, and Saori can be creepy now and then. I guess it shows this was written/directed by guys, projecting their own creepiness onto a woman to try to make it less objectionable. Yeah, this was much better than I expected. I like how it keeps it light-hearted. Now and then there's some trouble or embarrassment, but it's not dwelled upon for very long. Everything is very upbeat and positive. |
| Looking for Magical DoReMi (movie) | Good | Hmm, this was good. Can't quite call it a Ojamajo Doremi movie really. It's very much a "looking back on Ojamajo Doremi after 20 years" movie. Except maybe for a tiny bit of magical illusion at the very end the characters from the original series don't appear at all. Instead it's all about three women who are all still fans of Ojamajo Doremi. It's a nice story though. |
| Loups=Garous - The Motion Picture | Good | A good movie. Pity that one of the nicer characters died though, and another one disappeared at the end. It's not an epic story, but good entertainment. It seems though that the Sentai release of the movie makes Ayumi a boy, even in the subtitles. Bleh :( Sorry, but I won't be buying it after all then. |
| Lovege Chu - Miracle Seiyū Hakusho (TV) | Decent | Hmm. Only the first part focuses on the voice acting much. The rest is idol stuff and romantic drama. It's not bad, but I think it could have been half shorter. |
| Lucky Star (TV) | Excellent | A lot of fun. I'm not sure it's very useful to learn Japanese from if you don't already understand the language though. At first I even had a hard time keeping up with the subtitles. They talk so fast. It's a good series to watch just one ep. a day or so of while you're also watching something else because there's no plot to speak of. Of course I didn't, but that's not the point. |
| Lucky Star OVA | Very good | Yay, more Lucky☆Star! It's only one episode, but we take what we can get, ne? The characters seem to be a little cuter than usual. Otherwise it was pretty random. But who cares. It's Lucky☆Star! |
| Lunar Legend Tsukihime (TV) | Good | The first episode doesn't tell me much really. Oh wait, it's supposed to be a mystery. Well, that worked very well then. An interesting vampire story, but it was at the same time rather short and slow-moving. The ending was also kinda unsatisfying. |
| Lupin III: The Castle of Cagliostro (movie) | Good | Finally got around to watching this movie again. Wow, this DVD is double-sided. I don't think I have any others like that in my collection. A nice adventure/action caper, sometimes more spy thriller, sometimes more slapstick. Pity that the women (Clarisse and Fujiko) don't get more screentime, but you can't really expect that in a Lupin III title. I can't compare it to other Lupin III works, but Clarisse looks a lot like other Ghibli heroines. The character designs in general remind of '80s anime. |
| Macross 7 (TV) | Very good | Starts off as a generic 80s pop band story, then morphs into a super sentai series about half way. Near the end it becomes a little weird, but overall it's a decent series. It is very long though (49 eps.), so expect bits of boredom here and there. Most, if not all, episodes do progress the story though, so the boring bits are mainly the battles, and in the beginning the concerts. The music is mostly meh pop, but a few songs are better, and you'll come to like them anyway since they're repeated over and over. The main character Mylene Jenius starts out tsundere, but becomes more likeable over time. Nekki Basara starts out as rude and inconsiderate and doesn't change at all. He's probably supposed to come across as cool and visionary, but I wish he'd died in the first episode (without being revived). All in all I wouldn't say it's a top anime, but it's not totally bad either. Second time watching: Wow, I was pretty harsh about this the first time. What's up with that, Kimi? The music is with few exceptions pretty awesome. Mylene is a nice, if a bit of a kid, main character. Basara is still kindof a jerk, but he has his decent moments. Gamlin is completely meh throughout; I don't understand why Mylene would be interested in him other than conforming to expectations. Pity that Veffidas (btw, where did that spelling come from? it's pretty far from a transliteration of ビヒーダ) and Ray don't get much screentime, or Miria & Max for that matter. They're interesting in their own ways. Overall this is a really solid entry in the Macross universe. Definitely worth watching. |
| Macross 7 Encore (OAV) | Decent | According to Wikipedia these unaired eps. should go somewhere between eps.39-42. "On Stage" is interestingly put together. First you see Ray in flashback and wonder why he's suddenly white, then it turns out it was a dramatized reenactment. The actual events are shown later. Ep.2 is a bit meh, mostly embarrassing Miria. It does show Mylene joining the band though. Ep.3 is just silly fluff really. Overall these eps. do add a little detail to the Macross 7 canon, but can easily be skipped. |
| Macross 7 Plus (OAV) | Good | Hadn't noticed this had its own entry on ANN. Nothing too exciting, but it adds some little background details for most of the characters. |
| Macross 7 the Movie: The Galaxy's Calling Me! | Good | A somewhat standalone ep. set ~ep.39 of the series. Emilia is macron-size? Meaning Mylene could also do that. I figured it'd only work for full Zentraedi. What about full hunams then? Ah well. A nice, if pretty random, short story. I'd like to see Emilia more often. She seems like a nice character. |
| Macross Delta (TV) | Decent | Hmm, it looks like they were inspired by Symphogear for this one. Nice to see the idols do battle too for once. Oh, looks like this fansub group replaced the OP/ED with creditless versions. Idiots :( I could replace the video/audio source for the first two BD vols., but not the rest yet. Well, the idols don't do much battle it seems. I like the diversity in settings so far. The music doesn't really grab me yet though. Ep.13 brought out some fireworks, including Chekov's humongous mecha. I see why they delayed the second half of the series. Good on them for keeping the quality high. Well, that escalated quickly. Sorting algorithm of evil makes it hard to imagine what a next Macross season would do. The plot is also beginning to thicken. Ep.19 is a bit infodumpy/history, but it also connects this season a little more to the rest of Macross. And then ep.21 is again infodumpy. Well, there was quite a bit unclear yet, but to fill in the background like this is a bit much. Ep.24 doesn't seem to further the plot much aside from Mikumo getting caught, and ep.25 is yet another infodump ep. Sheesh. Ep.26 brings the expected fireworks, but there isn't that sense of epicness that the other final battles had. The love triangle doesn't get resolved, of course, and the ending is kinda tame. Overall this anime had a lot of potential, had a promising first ep., had a quite good (though not spectacular) first half, but completely bungled the second half. I think the plot was a bit too ambitious to be pulled off in 26 eps. while still giving depth to all the characters, but as it is neither the plot nor the characters got what they deserved. The classic Macross love triangle remained one-sided, and even the side that was made clear remained very subdued on both ends. Technically/visually it was all pretty good, but there could have been more action during most of the second half of the series. The writing was what was worst about this anime though. The first half was pretty good, although a few of the eps. plots ended up a bit pointless. The second half had too much infodumping, too much deus-ex-machina sudden reveals (and once you start analyzing it, too many plotholes), and wasted time on things that had already been well established (like a lot of ep.23/24's story) while not adding much character development to make it worth the time. So, yeah, not a completely bad entry in the franchise, but definitely not the best. What I liked best were the diverse settings seen in the first half. Lore-wise it tried to add a lot but ended up not doing much with it while leaving too many (potential) plotholes. |
| Macross Delta the Movie: Passionate Walkūre | Very good | A decent remix/alternate version of Macross Delta. Some interesting changes at least in the early part. I probably missed a bunch of changes because it's been years since I watched the series. The love triangle is again only a small hint. I think most of the songs from the series were used. Plus several new ones of course, though they weren't as impressive. Looking forward to the second movie next year. |
| Macross Dynamite 7 (OAV) | Good | Hmm, this looks a bit like that Plus ep. with Basara in a Wild West setting. Zola reminds a bit of the Macross Zero setting. With space whales. Instant awesome? I wonder if we'll see much of Mylene and the rest of the band. So far it's nearly only Basara, with a Mylene-lookalike. Well, we only get to see a few short gilmpses of the rest of the band. There's not much of a plot really for a 4-ep. OVA, mostly exploration of the setting. It's a pretty one though. This and Macross Zero have a lot of similar elements, what with the space whales and seaside village and stuff. |
| Macross FB7: Ore no Uta o Kike! (movie) | So-so | Wait, I thought this was supposed to take place after the events of Macross Frontier? But Michael is alive, so it must be earlier in the series. Anyway, this is a really compressed retelling of Macross 7 (49 eps.→1h30m, so yeah, super compressed) with commentary now and then by the Frontier gang. And at the end we get a 5 min. concert from the Frontier gang performing a medley of Fire Bomber songs. What Gabil was doing on Frontier is never explained :? |
| Macross Frontier (TV) | Excellent | Overall, a very good anime. Great 3D CG of course, as expected, nice art too, although there were some places where it sagged. The story is mostly good as well, but could have done with better pacing in my opinion. Sometimes it goes nice and slow to give depth to the characters, but very often it zooms by so fast that you have to watch scenes several times to get all the info. That does increase the tension of course, but I think the series could easily have been 40 eps. long without becoming boring. For the Macross fans there are tons of little references to earlier parts of the franchise. The ending was okay, but didn't answer all my questions. Definitely worth watching. Second time watching this. Is ep.15 a recap ep.? Hmm, about ⅔ of it is, and it's partly from Grace's POV, so has some new details. Ep.24 has a big infodump at the beginning, spelling everything up to there out. And yes, the ending is kinda cut short. It doesn't show what happen after the big battle. |
| Macross Frontier: The False Songstress (movie) | Weak | Is this an AU, or are they just reusing a lot of angles/scenes from the series? 8min. in we get another one of those "show off the 3D" shows :/ Yes,it's an AU remake of the series :/ This time Ranka and Alto already know eachother, and Sheryl is the one being saved during the first Vajra attack. Oh, continuity error. They reused some footage of Ranka during that attack, but she was wearing a different outfit during Sheryl's concert just earlier. Oops. Yah, they're reusing a lot of footage really. It's almost like Do You Remember Love? in that regard. Except here they added a lot of navel-gazey chatter in the middle that doesn't add anything to the story. Well, that was pretty disappointing. Part reused footage from the series, part weakly acted new stuff, part 3D spectacle. The story is just bleh, and the characterization and direction is super weak compared to the awesomeness of the series. Not recommended at all. At the end movie 2 was already announced. I hope that one at least uses the series's continuity and not this movie's. |
| Macross Frontier: The Wings of Farewell (movie) | Weak | Aw, it's a sequel to the first movie. Again no proper ending to the TV series. There's some weird imagery in Sheryl's concert at the beginning. I guess this is where Animator Expo ep.31 ("GIRL") got some of its inspiration :/ Background monitor are showing stuff from Black Jack, Tetsuwan Atom and real-life ads for Macross Frontier toys? What the beep? Are they even trying to make this a decent movie? o_0 In the middle we get first the old "why do you fight" talk (which never gets an answer, only serves to fill up time), then another instance of the whole group telling eachother what they discovered infodump. The ending goes back toward the original story a bit, with the Galaxy folks behind Grace as the big bad this time. The plotting was shoddy though, with a lot of dei ex machina. They also wiggled their way out of "the love triangle gets resolved" that they used to lure fans (who were likely disappointed with the first movie), by first pretending to eliminate Sheryl, then Alto choosing miraculously saved Sheryl over Ranka, then having Alto disappear without a trace (together with all the Vajra, so that part also gets conveniently dodged). Meh. Again, these movies are not recommended at all. |
| Macross Plus (OAV) | So-so | Oh goody, another anime starring obnoxious assholes with way too much testosterone. And the women act like they are actually interested in them. Blech. Well, at least the music by Yoko Kanno is decent. The animation is good too, although the art itself is a little off at times (faces and hands especially). |
| Macross Plus Movie Edition | So-so | Cuts out quite a bit of detail and backstory, and doesn't really add much. Just a few shots and changed dialogue here and there. Macross Plus is by far the weakest entry in the Macross franchise. TVTropes repeatedly calls Myun a "broken bird", and basically blames her for Sharon's actions. In fact, she's the most successful of the three main characters. Although she feels sad about it, she's accepted the loss of her childhood dream of being a singer and has moved on to a very successful career as a director. Even after having been assaulted by him in the past, when she meets Guld again after several years, she's very friendly with him, only fliching once when he grabs her shoulders. She wouldn't be able to do all that if she were a "broken bird". The story basically treats her as the prize Guld and Isamu fight over though. Guld, after once assaulting Myun, is now taking medication for his anger issues and despite having his condition blamed on his race and getting other discrimination has managed a successful career himself. He is a bit too forceful now and then, but is otherwise quite civil in his relationship with Myun. In the end though, he can't escape his past and gets to nobly sacrifice himself so white hero Isamu can save the world and get the girl. Isamu on the other hand has a long, documented history of lacking impulse control and willfully disregarding others' wishes and safety. The only reason he hasn't been fired or locked up is that higher-ups keep covering for him and moving him around to new stations. Yet the story treats him as the hero. |
| Macross Zero (OAV) | Very good | Gorgeous art and animation. The music isn't especially great, but visually this is a masterpiece. The story is set before SDF Macross, but since Zero is from 2002 it isn't referenced until Macross Frontier. There are definitely a lot of references, so be sure to watch Zero first. Even if you don't care for the whole Macross franchise, this one shouldn't be missed for its visuals. |
| Madlax (TV) | Excellent | Even better soundtrack than Noir, seriously. The characters are not as deep, but that's maybe simply because there are more main characters. I wish Vanessa and Elinore hadn't died though. Otherwise quite satisfying. |
| Maesetsu! Opening Act (TV) | Very good | About comedy duos (manzai I suppose?), by creator(s) of Lucky Star (though apparently not in that style). I'd like to know more about this. Hmm, even if it isn't relatedd, they do acknowledge LS by having the characters imitate a sketch from it in ep.1. They call it a joke that always bombs, and tbh the first ep. didn't feel that great. Ep.2 is more interesting though. It's clear that the main characters and their friends just always have slightly manzai-style conversations, which makes just hearing them talk already a little like one of their shows. So far it's, compared to LS, like a lesser sketch, but I expect it'll have some funny moments as well. It gradually gets better after the first ep. Not all the jokes are great, but I guess they're aimed at a Japanese audience. Someone on the forum described this anime as being about comedy instead of comedy. That's a good description, although the characters are all professional (or aspiring) comedians, so their conversations still end up having comedic timing and retorts and stuff (which is common in anime in general, but here it feels like it really belongs). I'd say that in addition to being about comedy it's also about the people who love comedy. Recommended if you're curious about manzai-style comedy. |
| Magic Knight Rayearth (TV) | So-so | Wasn't really worth watching. The first season was sort of okay, although as a standard fantasy quest fairly predictable (except for the ending, which was a not so great twist). The second season just dragged on sloowly :( Too much reuse of animation overall. I didn't bother finishing the OVA. |
| Magic Knight Rayearth 2 (TV) | Weak | See Magic Knight Rayearth season one. |
| (The) Magic Lamp and the Moving Islands (movie) | So-so | This is part two. Part one, three. The first part didn't feel this short. This one's not even 46min. between opening and closing credits. I guess the magic lamp will show up again in part 3, because here it's nothing more than a mcguffin. Several details don't make much sense, such as a single giant living on the island with hardly enough food to sustain it, the island apparently going underwater from time to time yet having lots of plants that don't fit that situation, the ship showing up again in the middle of the ocean without any tracking device, etc. The villains also conveniently run away without taking their hostages or loot with them. I get the feeling the script writer had to fill in a lot of details to make this from the original fairy tale into this trilogy, but didn't have the writing skill/talent to make a good story. The result is the original adventure bits filled with little things of no consequence that are supposed to be understood as a story but that really aren't much of one. There's several instances of characters silently gazing at eachother without any dialogue or explanation. That sort of thing feels a bit cheap if the rest of the story doesn't support it. So far this trilogy could've been shortened to just one movie with less handwaves at story and more actual adventuring. Or just left as a written fairy tale. |
| Magic of Stella (TV) | Decent | So, this is sort of New Game the school club? Well, cute slice of life is okay. Hmm. The first ep. already has questionable subs, but all three releases I tried have the exact same text. One of them was HorribleSubs, so that means the official subs are not very good. I dunno, are these really the official subs? I mean, that first ep. was bad, but some of this looks like copy-pasted automated translation. The OVA was a prequel ep. about the original three SNS members, split in two parts. It gives Fujikawa finally some focus, but that's all. Hmm, It was okay, but sort of lacking. Like someone knew in theory how to make a slice-of-life:cute anime, but not quite how to make interesting characters. Or maybe it's the way things happen so slowly. You'd expect that not a whole lot happens in this genre, but here the action itself is slowed down. Like, a lot of the time you're looking at images that don't move at all except for a slow pan or zoom. It's okay to do that in quiet, contemplative scenes, but here's its often done to more busy scenes too, so I think it's just a cost-saving thing. There were at least two cases of characters speaking without their mouths moving too. But mostly it's just the characters not being very interesting or the interesting things being left out. |
| Magic Tree House (movie) | So-so | Based on a(n)( series of) American children's book(s). I wonder how anime this will be. They speak Japanese at least. Feels to me like Morgan is the main character, but the book(s)/movie probably intend Annie & Jack to be the MCs. Ah well, an okay children's adventure story. A little too much focus on Jack instead of Morgan and Annie though. |