I meant to check out the manga a while ago but never got around to it. Despite the weird fact that this was initially just announced as 13 episode deal I still opted for the anime and if it wasn't for that limitation it would actually have been a solid "shounen" package.
The show is pretty standard WSJ fare with inspiration taken from US comics. This doesn't mean that it's bad but the pacing didn't feel great. The episodes are padded with flash backs and other means to pretty much end in a decent spot after those 13 episodes.
I'll probably continue my plan to just pick up the manga someday but I'm not in a hurry for that.
This show is a bit of a mixed bag for me. There were instances where to show was really fun and cute but also plenty of jokes that weren't home runs to say the least. I was hoping it would be more slice of life centered anyways but the "story" towards the end and the skits about idoldom didn't really fit along with a lot of advertisement for real world brands.
There has been a huge backlash for the anime as the mangaka himself posted that he was disappointed in it's ending with lots of people finding it to be abusive and meanspirited. I myself haven't really been bothered by this but there is certainly a truth there.
A perfectly fine slice of life anime but just like the source meterial I'm missing something to really get me invested. Also not a fan of Chinatsu's seiyuu.
Hibana is going to be the first "Netflix Original" (best-seller adaptation) produced in Japan and I'm curious to see how popular it's going to be. The first three episodes I've seen so far didn't really strike me as something that would appeal to the same market as the US productions though. They aren't bad by any means and have the same film-like approach like many modern shows but "foreign" movies aren't something people flock to in hordes. I'm looking forward to watch the rest anyways and that every director has two episodes spanning a time period of the main characters sounds cool too.
That twist is so cringey I just had to stop with this show.
Ajin is the second time Polygon Pictures got Netflix on it's production committee but just like Sidonia it's all CG again which already kills off some interested parties which is weird seeing as the manga is rather popular. This series as it is now is pretty much a cross promotion: the first half of the series, with a little less content, ran in cinemas as a limited release (https://trakt.tv/movies/ajin-demi-human-compel-2015) with the content of the second half of the TV series premiering in May as Part 2 (https://trakt.tv/movies/ajin-demi-human-collision-2016). The final arc of the anime will stay exclusive to it's cinema release only. If you're wondering what route you should pick I'd say watch this and then the final movie. They're not that self contained that you need the "movie" experience.
As previously mentioned this is all CG and that is fine by me. There are still issues but I actually enjoyed watching it a lot more than reading. The story isn't really a standout and has enough violence in it to sell the seinen but it's still worth pointing out that just after a single volume the original writer left for another series of his and left the work to his artist who then took over both roles and that isn't a bad thing as it only improved. As of now we're pretty much at a Death Note-esque duel between the protagonist and the antagonist which is sort of enjoyable considering they're both immortal and can utilize some interesting strategies.
Osomatsu-san was the unlikely champion of the last two seasons - at least when it came to making dosh. Based on a manga from the 80s it is mostly a reimagining by Studio Pierrot. Given this setup it seems even weirder that it got to the place it is. As it turned out it has been welcomed in fujoshi community. They tend to enjoy all male casts and given the hiki-neet attitude of the guys that are even easy to draw yourself just seemed to hit all the checkboxes (along with the censor drama around the first BD volume). Now one shouldn't blame a show for it's fandom and in this case they should get some applause. The show was pretty much allowed to do whatever it wanted. The comedy that usually plays out as multiple sketches in an episodes can get really inspired. That's not to say they're all perfect (and some are slightly lost in translation) but it's a fun ride overall.
Dimension W had the potential of being a great show but for me it didn't come together. I blame that mostly on the lack of synergy between the leads early on and the rushed, or at least strongly condensed, ending.
Studio 3Hz is still a new studio but so far they showed a lot of premise. I'm sure they can get it down at some point.
On P.A. Work's conquest of being a studio that puts out either good or awful shows, HaruChika joins the latter ones. It really comes off as a poor man's KyoAni work mixing together Sound Euphonium and Hyouka, along with the most boring mysteries ever.
This is pretty much Saekano without fanservice, and a lot more boring.
Bubuki Buranki is a bit of a hot mess. The story has good ideas in the world building but the way it was unfolding seemed to be all over the place, especially in the later episodes. The 3DCG while still odd in some places was actually quite decent and worked for the show.
I doubt the second cour/season will change much about the issues but I'm down to watch some more.
Myriad Colors of Phantom World is the most recent in-house Light Novel adaptation from KyoAni. Unlike the ones before they didn't even award it their own grand prize (after which they publish submitted works). For whatever is written in the original work not much seemed to have made it on screen besides the core concept of the phantoms (I have however little proof for this except the back blurbs google translations). The episodes are all episodic and varying greatly in quality, most of them are however bland setups for fan service and action scenes. Don't get me wrong, they can be creative... it's just that the whole cast and the battles they're put in are not engaging at all.
The characters have the depth of whatever waifu generator that is cool right now. Needles to say they don't need much of a personality. This also fits in with whatever (little) logic this world carries; each and everyone of them feels redundant as it's mostly a gamble as to whose power is able to defeat what phantom.
I have the feeling this wasn't anyone's passion project and the intended audience is probably quite young given the lengthy exposition intros every episode (or maybe that is related to them opening up an English website).
I'm dropping this show as of Episode 7. I gave it a chance but especially with the last two they only made it much worse.
Taking the now age old concept of people being trapped in video games, these folks wake up with no recollection of their pasts and little desire to change anything about that. This setup however is only a cheap way to help with self-insert as it hardly plays a role in the show (just to pad the time with sometimes lengthy expositions about boring abilities). Instead Grimgar is focused on keeping everything as mundane as possible within it's fantasy setting: the protagonists are poor, suck at fighting, spend their time cooking and dwelling in teenage drama. The only enemies they fought so far are goblins, goblins, goblins... and goblins. Everything proceeds at snail pacing and that with only 12 episodes in total. There are other people that woke up in this world too but they all progressed much further in rank in the same time so there is no excuse to keep them as trashy as they are.
The problem however isn't just that it's slow but also that it's presented quite badly. Instead of ranting about the immature dialogue here or other shit they pull it is probably best to point to the production side of this show: it's further ruined by the urge to get money. Grimgar wasn't exactly a popular light novel and it seems they added in quite a lot of ways to generate revenue (kinda similar to how MARVEL markets it's universe). The edgy as fuck traumatic episode featuring a fight to death with a poor, lonely goblin ends with the boys trying to peek at the naked girls bathing. It was totally out of place and guess what, that part is sold as a BD special with the first volume.
In similar ways the insert songs work for the show. You get whatever plot in the first half and then montages of whatever mood the cast is in overlayed with insert songs. It totally fails but figure what; the band belongs to the production company of the anime and they're releasing the OP and ED discs...
While there were enough reasons to drop this one earlier I was kind of hoping for something unique. The visuals did that in a way with lush water color backgrounds but the animation ended up being mostly absent in many scenes further hinting at the lack of dedicated talent to this show.
After the last two episodes of truly autistic teenage problems I can safely say that this show has no potential at all and you're better of watching something else.
A boring procedural that makes little sense with kitsch mythology mixed and starring Lucifer as the ultimate douché. Seeing that the main hook should come from the chemistry between him and the cop lady and they're at backwood sexism there I'm not seeing any hope for the show.
Dropped as of Episode 4.
A fun but short series that brings genre sensibilities to TV. It's not without flaws but I gladly take more shows like this.
Streaming world wide at http://www.sbs.com.au/ondemand/video/600180803988/the-wizards-of-aus-honk (there is no proper index)
Sakamoto is based as fuck. This is going to be great.
Kowabon aimed to deliver horror in mere 3 minute scenarios involving a bunch of ghosts revealing themselves either through cameras or the internet. As one might have guessed this doesn't really work nor do you get any tension in that time. Apart from one or two scenes that had a cool idea there is really nothing to see here. To make matters worse immediately after the camera noise and the ghost appearing we switch to a terrible ear bleeding ending song (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=imBwJ2F8eLk) that features cute ghost designs and shows the behind the scenes for that particular episode. The reason for that is mostly that they wanted to showcase that they animated it by rotoscoping (drawn over live-action footage).
This is the first directing credit for the guy so I will put it to that but he has worked for Studio4°C before being a producer at the small studio that made this and other titles. Still, he should have know better (or maybe they have just been pushed into this to sell the song or w/e).
Not recommended.
How to sexualize workout routines.
Did you know that Hakone had hot springs (onsen)? They have hot springs and you (if you're Japanese) should come visit them: the show. Not that I believe the area needed more advertisement but hey, it apparently does. No volcanic action in this though!
Next to the aptly named Hakone-chan there is another weird mascot in this (from the Boxappy family) which I belive is just from one resort so my guess is they funded this.
A rather boring series featuring a set of bland characters and subpar animation.
Kagewani ("Shadow crocodile") comes from the same Director/Write combo as Yami Shibai which shows because the art and animation style is basically the same and it's also a short series with it's themes focused on horror. Where the two shows are different however is the story format. This one actually has an overarching story that comes into play in latter episodes.
I'm certain the visuals are not everyone's cup of tea but I think it works for the show. The monsters also have some cool designs that are lovecraftian inspired but suffer when they're animated.
This won't spook you but if you like horror you can't be a beggar when it comes to anime to pick from.
As a side note: The writer of this also has a second show airing at the moment called 'Kowabon' which focuses on ghosts which unlike this I would not recommend.
TRIGGER seems to like doing side jobs and short series like this inbetween their original projects (playing it quite discreet here).
Hacka doll is based on a mobile app where the dolls featured in the series #1, #2, #3 etc. serve as mascots who deliver you news to various nerdy topics from different content sites. They're supposed to be learning what content you like from which the whole "advance" aspect of this show comes from. The gang is thrown in different settings based on the users who downloaded their app. They then try to help them with their problem which usually ends up in a failure (this is a comedy after all).
I enjoyed myself with the show and the parodies were diverse, unfortunately some episodes weren't quite hitting the mark. Still, if you're looking for a short comedy series with "otaku" based humor it isn't a bad pick though!
I can't say this show engaged me in the least bit. The mystery is done very poorly and the characters are bland. There is really not much to care for here. The wrap-around can't be blamed for this except that it is overly colorful (probably just because of her name) and even has a "transformation" sequence in the earlier episodes which is odd for a show focused on bones. It's really the content that is lacking.
btw: Now that there is a TMDB link for this show - good job on the terrible screen captures... doggie dog dog dog.
This was a fun but short series that is a bit disjointed. Some of the episodes focus on the "spirit medium teacher" in school while the others focus on some cats (whose acclaimed king she is too). Both areas have their highlights but I feel like it would have been a lot better if they stayed with students more often. The chaotic music added to the insanity!
Another cute and harmless 4-koma adaptation from the same author as "I Can't Understand What My Husband Is Saying". Why does Komori have a giant rack? I would like to know that too... they're totally out of place.
Sort of surprising to see almost no fans of the main show showed up for this. This was alright for a cash grab parody to be honest. Given it's generic school setting and episode themes they could have cut the episodes shorter than the 17 minutes they now had without much loss (it's all due to giving the huge cast screentime).
I read that this was a reverse C3bu (or just Ouran with airguns) but as it turns out it isn't... It's perma edge X bad drama.
I didn't care for this show at all which you sort of have to given the pace and non-resolution after season 1. I'm still not quite sure if a more careful watch wouldn't have made the mystery even more obvious as it has been imho quite on the nose...
Reading the title, getting expectations: doing it wrong. You get the cover here which in the beginning are some fun spoofs of RPG tropes but after a few episodes always end up being more blunt with the bikinis.
From what I head Monster Musume has it roots deep in the fetish market... being about monster girls and all. With each iteration of the story/characters this got a little tamer. This isn't saying much though as it's still quite racy. That is also my main gripe with the show: making a little girl a bird monster shouldn't be an excuse to sexualize lolis. Same applies for mental potato heads.
Looking past all that we have a colorful cast of monster girls forming a harem around the main character allowing for some alternate takes on tired antics. Not a masterpiece but sort of fun.
Couldn't feel any less visual novel-y. They skipped quite a bunch of character work to get through more story and also focusing a little too much on not so interesting characters.
