Well, I have seen a lot of anime over the past couple of months. More so than in my entire lifetime to that pont. Some fantastic, some..not so much. A lot of long running series got finished up round about the same time last week, so here's the rundown of what I thought:
Ghost In The Shell : SAC - Amazing. Simply genius in every aspect. If someone asked me what makes anime so good, I would point this out straight away. Intellectual, beautifully drawn and with a fantastic setting. I will admit it does take repeated viewings to attempt to take the story in, but it's worth it. And rarely, it's a case of where the 2nd series is indeed better than the 1st. And the opening credits for both series is the best I've ever seen. Oh, and the tachikoma's rule!
Planetes - After GITS, this would be 2nd as my anime of choice. Anime doesn't always have to have giant robots or special powers for it to work and this is proof of that. It does start slow the first couple of episodes, but then the story picks up and you really begin to care for the characters and can't help but be impressed by the attention to detail. Also contains some of the finest characterisation seen yet and you do sense that the characters have been on a journey and have changed as a result. Probably not for everyone, but I can't recommend it enough.
Fullmetal Alchemist - Always seen this as highly recommended amongst anime fans and can see why. I enjoyed it, some nice twists here and there and some great action. But I'm sure 90% of anime fans probably knew that anyway
Wolf's Rain - Great post-apocalyptic action, but was horribly disappointed by the ending which never really brought it to a conclusion.
Innocent Venus - Enjoyable, with a genuine twist midway through that was shocking. But nothing more than good.
Guyver : The Bioboosted Armor - Now here I literally asked 'WTF?' at the end of it all. Now I was enjoying this. Yes the protaganist whined too much and never found the resolve to do much and the storyline was next to paper thin, but regardless I enjoyed the action which sold the premise alone. So, without wanting to spoil it, when I say the ending leaves everything hanging in mid-air, with the bad guys still at large and the protaganist reaching a point where he is stronger than ever and determined to take the fight to them and then have the ending credits roll, well to say it's a massive dissapointment would be a severe understatement. I can only hope a new series is being made to continue the story, otherwise the past 26 weeks amounted to nothing.
Neon Genesis Evangelion - Jeez I thought I had enough with Wolf's Rain and Guyver's bad endings. I presume many here can understand it better than I can, but can someone actually point out to me if there's any genuine ending to this thing? Because to me, having Sho and Asuka spend 2 episodes having an internal struggle to get over their emo state is great and all, but what about the Earth itself? Was there a 3rd impact or what? Also, would it kill the dubbing version to fill in a few details? Having kanji appear on screen amounts to nothing when the person watching can't read it and has to make suggestions on what was asked. Even a simple subtitle at the bottom would do.
This Ugly Yet Beautiful World - Actually gave up on it after 6 episodes. Like I mentioned earlier, it appeared promising, but the aspect that I found appealing was never actually developed further during the time I watched it. Instead I was treated to a simply boring romance type anime that didn't do anything for me. It may have returned to sadistic monster aspect later in the series, but now I simply couldn't care less when all of the characters actually make me want to see them suffer for being so annoying.
See? Told you it was a lot. The anime channels here don't appear to be updating their line up soon, and for now, I'm still watching Azumanga Daioh (which gets better) and Kurau Phantom Memory (getting rather dull actually, however the opening and ending songs are damn near the best I've
ever heard. The ending song in particular, 'Moonlight', just resonates something within me and makes me want to explain why it's special but I just can't find the words. That's something I think all good music has.)
Also, I reached Episode 60 in Monster, till I found out that the rest of the links were unavailable. So here I am, just 12 more episodes away from this huge series and I find out I can't see what happens to the likes of Tenma, Nina, Lunge, Eva, Dieter or Johaan (surely one of the most chilling villans in anime)
Topic: What Anime Are You Watching Now? (Read 196868 times)