One of these things is not like the other~ Something that has always perplexed me is why anime fans don’t watch more Jdramas. I’m sure this could be for any number of reasons but many dramas are based off anime  (Hana Yori Dango, Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon, GTO, Nana, etc.) and some seriously seem to have [...]
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Visual preview by ChartfagWinter anime season is slowly approaching so we could take a look at the lineup. The number of new series is not much big so far, but there's still a lot of time for new announcements.I know I will watchOokami Kakushi (alternatively Hidden God)It's based on the same called visual novel for PSP. The script of the game is written by Ryuukishi07, whom I admire for his previous works (Higurashi, Umineko).Is it a god (kami)? Or a wolf (ookami)? A secret law in the old part of town ... brings together dread and mystery. It is the summer of Shouwa 58, 1983. Ten stories, intertwined by the idle thoughts of people caught in repeating nightmares ... what could possibly be the truth therein!?I'm looking forward to this very much. I don't know anything about the original, the visual novel, but I believe it's got high potential, as the story is written by a god. So everything depends on Takamoto Nobuhiro, Machida Touko, Watanabe Atsuko, and studio AIC, and how they will pull it off.Ookami Kakushi official pageNodame Cantabile FinaleI've enjoyed the previous seasons so I have high expectations for the upcoming one, too. Let's see how the story about promising conductor Chiaki and promising pianist Nodame will end.<object width="480" height="385"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/UMxzJxlxXCs&amp;hl=cs&amp;fs=1&amp;"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/UMxzJxlxXCs&amp;hl=cs&amp;fs=1&amp;" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="385"></embed></object>Nodame Cantabile official pageSO・RA・NO・WO・TOSet in the future on a land that, after being marred by long-lasting wars, has settled into a quiet cycle of decline. Kanata Kumika is a 15-year-old girl who fulfills her dream of enlisting in the army and joins a unit of five girls who protect a fortress that looms over a little village. The girls also play music that reverberates across the skies over towns without people and seas without fish.Girls play music in the sky, and they look like the members of the light music club at Sakurakou High School. Alternative title for this anime might be "Sora no K-ON!" which can be translated as K-ON of the Sky. But note that this anime is not animated by KyoAni, it's by A-1 Pictures. Still, the resemblance is evident.Director Kanbe Mamoru (Elfen Lied, Denpa Teki na Kanojo), scriptwriter Yoshino Hiroyuki (Macross Frontier, Denpa Teki na Kanojo), animator Toshifumi Akai (Kannagi) and musical composer Ooshima Michiru (Full Metal Alchemist, Hana Yori Dango).If it doesn't entertain me at least, I will drop it later.Dance in the Vampire BundAfter millennia in hiding, Mina Tepes, the Princess of the ancient covenant and ruler of all vampires, wants change. Using the vast wealth of the Tepes line, she has paid off the entire gross national debt of Japan and in so doing, gained the authority to create a "special district" off the coast of Japan that is to become the future haven to vampires the world over! Now, on the eve of the landmark press conference announcing the existence of vampires to the world, terrorists and rival factions are plotting to assassinate Mina Tepes before she has a chance to make her world-changing announcement.The plot seems to be interesting and what's more it is animated by SHAFT. I love SHAFT's style, and particularly their experimental scenes.It is directed by Shinbou Akiyuki, who has directed all of the Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei seasons, Bakemonogatari, Maria Holic, Tsukuyomi, Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha and so on. There's no doubt he's a man of great works.<object width="480" height="385"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/UmOEHatpuEA&amp;hl=cs&amp;fs=1&amp;"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/UmOEHatpuEA&amp;hl=cs&amp;fs=1&amp;" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="385"></embed></object>Dance in the Vampire Bund official pageI might watch, I will check it outSeikon no Qwaser (Qwaser of Stigmata)The story takes place on the grounds of St. Mihailov Academy, a Japanese Eastern Orthodox school, and draws heavily on religious references from the aforementioned religion. Here it follows the trials and hardship of two of its students, Oribe Mafuyu and Tomo Yamanobe, until the encounter with a mysterious, silver-haired, Russian boy named Alexander, or Sasha for short. This pits them and the whole school in an all-out war between the Church itself and the so-called "Adepts", a sect of individuals wielding powers linked to the elements of chemistry.A lot of ecchi and fanservice. Which is obvious as soon as you know that they use breast milk as the main source of power.<object width="480" height="295"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/eG-2u4G3G5s&amp;hl=cs&amp;fs=1&amp;"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/eG-2u4G3G5s&amp;hl=cs&amp;fs=1&amp;" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="295"></embed></object>Seikon no Qwaser official pageDURARARA!The author Narita and illustrator Yasuda Suzuhito’s “distorted love story” is set in Ikebukuro, Tokyo, and revolves around an ensemble cast including street thugs, high school students, a female radio host, an underworld doctor, a young information vendor, and a headless Irish fairy.Don't know about the storyline, I know hardly anything about it, but the trailer looks great. Watch it! The trailer, I mean.<object width="480" height="385"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/0YVNwzhaR78&amp;hl=cs&amp;fs=1&amp;"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/0YVNwzhaR78&amp;hl=cs&amp;fs=1&amp;" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="385"></embed></object>The male cast features an awesome trio, Fukuyama Jun, Kamiya Hiroshi, and Daisuke Ono.Durarara! official pageLadies versus ButlersThe school romantic comedy revolves around Hino Akiharu, an ordinary high school student who unfortunately looks like a juvenile delinquent. He enrolls into an academy that was once a school for upper-class ladies, and he is placed in the school's newly established servant training department. The students there are raised to be either maids or butlers, and Akiharu finds himself in the middle of the bickering cliques.Most likely an ordinary fanservice moe anime that uses maids as its main force of attraction. Some well-known names in the cast, such as Kugimiya Rie, and Nakahara Mai. I might give it a shot, but I will probably pass.I can't say for sure that I won't give any other series a try. Not even K-ON! was in my roster at first. But I don't give the other series much hope at the moment.There will be of course new OVAs as well as continuations of earlier released OVAs. Furthermore, three or four highly anticipated movies will come to cinemas. Those are The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya, Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha the MOVIE 1st, Eden of the East the Movie II, and Fate/stay night Unlimited Blade Works.
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Quality animation in last week’s episode. Ok so clearly the best part of the episode was this: LOL Kajika almost threw the vase at them too and JP was like “holy shit someone’s about to get hana yori dango’d” Okay that was pretty sweet. But the lulz aside I really like Carl and Kajika. I [...]
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Discotek Media -- purveyors of mostly classic anime, plus the Hana Yori Dango drama and others, has announced a few new acquisitions that the wannabe manly men out there will be interested in: Fist of the North Star the TV series, episodes 1 through 152, along with Lupin the Third Episode 0 First Contact and Sea Prince and the Fire Child . They also acquired a live-action movie called Oresama, starring Japanese rocker Miyavi. FotNS will be releaesd in four box sets, but honestly, I'm more interested in the Lupin special, which tells the tale of Jigen, Lupin, Fujiko, and Ishikawa Goemon III's first meeting...and Lupin's first run-in with Inspector Zenigata. I don't know very much about the Sea Prince and the Fire Child film, either, but if any of you do, share it in the comments! Sounds like good times all around, anyway. Stay tuned for more info as it comes available!
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Sugar wa Otoshigoro isn't a personal favorite of mine, but it's still a solid entry into the "very,-very-close-friends-who-might-become-something-more" yuri subtext-niche. The quirky, likeable protagonists are what make this otherwise unremarkable high school dramedy worth checking out. Hatanaka Keiko is a slightly cracked high school student with unusual ambitions. She dreams of becoming a prostitute when she grows up- in fact, when she posts about it on her cell phone blog, she gets a whopping 500+ comments from people, mostly telling her that she's nuts. Otherwise, she's a pretty typical student, with a working dad, a housewife mom, and a harmlessly snotty little sister. She's also a tomboy with a habit of singing her feelings out loud, whose classmates view her as something of an outsider. Enter Asami Tsubaki, a cool-headed, acerbic girl who works in the school library and is considered much more of an outsider than Keiko because rumors are running amok that she was a prostitute in high school. Keiko befriends her and they remain close, even after Keiko learns about the rumors from her gossip-mongering "friends." Tsubaki (my favorite character) doesn't really care what her classmates think of her (yay!), and the girls continue to grow closer, even as Honda, a kind, but rough-around-the-edges boy from Tsubaki's old school, enters the equation and expresses (unrequited) interest in her- and Tsubaki's background continues to haunt her. Sugar wa Otoshigoro succeeds on several different levels for me. It works as... a story about an amusingly unconventional friendship- Tsubaki and Keiko have great chemistry together as friends, which leads me to this story working as... an incipient, slow-cooking yuri romance- or rather, a friendship with strong romantic subtext during volume 1, although it looks like the yuri will become more pronounced from the next volume on. This volume really doesn't shy away from painting its characters with the yuri subtext brush, though- one of my favorite moments is when Keiko starts singing a love song to a tsubaki (camellia) plant at home while thinking of Tsubaki, and her family is just like "wtf is she doing?" But while Sugar wa Otoshigoro does contain yuri overtones, it isn't flowery and escapist. Instead it manages to be... a story that addresses "gritty" topics teenagers (sometimes) cope with- like bullying, rape, etc- without making me feel like face-palming and setting the manga down. I don't like reading many titles that focus on characters dealing with issues like that, like LIFE and Hana Yori Dango, because I really don't enjoy reading umpteen volumes of some girl being physically and psychologically victimized at school. (Or anywhere else- hence, why I don't care for Last Friends.) Keiko's classmates are gossipy and annoying, but they don't overwhelm the draw of the story- Tsubaki and Keiko's deepening friendship. Plus, Tsubaki doesn't suffer from Tohru Honda Syndrome and act like Sunshine Sue to people who give her crap. Keiko acts more conciliatory, but not to the point of me disliking her. The dialogue is well-written also, with some gems of humor scattered throughout. :) (Like Tsubaki's reaction to Keiko's aspirations and Honda's ill-fated attempts to extract information about Tsubaki from Keiko.) The story strikes a very good balance between lighthearted humor and drama. The art looks good enough. It conveys the story well, with distinct, expressively-drawn character designs- especially when it comes to Keiko's body language. The character designs look a little rough, and aside from Keiko, Tsubaki, Honda, and Keiko's mother and sister, all of the character designs are forgettable. (The peripheral characters often aren't even drawn with eyes- although it may be a stylistic choice at times, like when one of Keiko's classmates is drawn with eyes for the first time when she begins to understand Keiko.) In short, Sugar wa Otoshigoro is a good comedy-drama with appealing leads that I would recommend- whether Keiko and Tsubaki become an item or not. (But of course, it would be nice. ^^ Sugar runs in Young King, a bi-weekly(!) seinen magazine published by Shōnen Gahosha.) Story: B Art: C+ Overall: B And unrelated: Oooh, I can't wait until the finale of CANAAN comes out tomorrow!! ^___^ I'm moving all of my junk things to a new room tomorrow, which will be a little bit of a hassle- but that final episode will be my reward at the end of the day. :3 And don't miss the finale of Saki this Sunday!!
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I generally don’t link to polls, but I was fascinated by this one. The survey, conducted by Oricon, took in 1,000 Japanese men and women in equal numbers, evenly distributed amongst those in their teens, twenties, thirties and forties. 1. Slam Dunk 2. Hana Yori Dango 3. Dragonball 4. Death Note 5. Hikaru no Go 6. Touch 7. Itazura na Kiss 8. Love Com 9. [...]
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Hana Yori Dango Episodes: 51 Genres: Drama, Romance, Comedy Aired: Sep 8, 1996 to Aug 31, 1997 Producer: Toei Animation For years now I have been hearing about the J-drama Hana Yori Dango, but not being a big J-drama fan I decided to check out the anime instead. Story: The series revolves around a common high school girl [...]
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Shinobu Kaitani's popular manga Liar Game, in which an ex-convict and swindler and an earnest, struggling college student find themselves tangled up in an ongoing and mysterious game called the “Liar Game,” was made into a drama back in 2007, ending in June of that year.Back in April it was announced that the drama would continue with a second season and a theatrical film as well, with the return of stars Erika Toda (live-action Death Note's Misa Amane) and Shota Matsuda (live-action Hana Yori Dango's Sojiro). It looks like the entire rest of the cast and crew is back on hand.A bit more info on these continuations was just announced. The new TV season is creatively titled Liar Game Season 2, and is will start in November, airing on Tuesdays at 9pm on Fuji TV. (The image above is from the first season, so ignore the date and time info in the corner.)The movie is due to hit theaters on February 6, 2010, distributed by Touhou. A mobile phone site is being developed to talk about the story, which seems to involve a “virtual” Liar Game as well as the “real” Liar Game.Liar Game is one of those cool-sounding series that makes me wonder why VIZ hasn't brought it out in the US yet (it's a Shueisha title). It sounds like a natural progression for fans of series like Death Note, and the dramas are hugely popular too, which probably suits manga, anime, and live-action distributor VIZ (although I don't know if they've released any J-dramas yet, just movies so far?).Any of you familiar with Liar Game, be it the drama or the manga?
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Out of all the Boys Over Flowers (Hana Yori Dango) adaptations in Asia, each character had been played by different actors/actresses. Now it’s time to decide which one of them is the hottest when it comes on looking and playing the part of their respective character! Due to Hana Yori Dango’s immense popularity, it has been [...]
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Kamen Rider Kabuto and Kamen Rider Den-O co-star in this Japanese drama that TimelesSubs finished releasing their Hardsub for this drama just the other day. I just finished watching the first episode and liked it quite a bit. I just love jdramas based on manga's set in a school like Hana Yori Dango and Hana Kimi. Some of the guys from Hana Kimi, Nanba and Oscar to mention a few play butlers. It's a funny story of rich girls and the poor girl who get's dropped in their midst.Download the complete series here.
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