The summer never truly ends.
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As I go four episodes onward, there appears to be a surplus of kissing and blushing with a side of pie in your face.
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Spiral! Summer hurricane!!
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The return of the storm of summer finally hits!
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After three episodes of most new shows, the time has come to say something about them.For me, Dance in the Vampire Bund is clearly the best new show. I know no-one else agrees, but that's okay. So far (up to episode 3) I think it is real visual, filmic, and dramatic art. More later in this post.And although it didn't look like this was going to be much of a season, there are actually several more good and/or watchable shows. (click images to enlarge)Baka to Test to Shoukanjuu was my pre-season pick. It has taken three episodes for me to really get it, but it is now clicking for me in a big way. Director Oonuma Shin was my reason for picking this show, and we can clearly see his touch in its look.But one of the best things he did was pick crazy auteur Nabeshin (Watanabe Shinichi, director of Excel Saga and PuniPuni Poemi) to storyboard and direct episode three -- which was totally crazy and utterly hilarious.On the Japanese discussion board 2channel, the most popular new show is Sora no Oto, the moe slice-of-life anime featuring a platoon of five girls who are the guard in a postwar guardpost in an alternative-universe Euro/Japanese town. Their main function seems to be to play reveille every morning on a bugle from the ramparts.The animation, voice-acting, and especially the backgrounds are excellent. As are the gentle and humane atmosphere and characters.The next most popular new show on 2channel is Durarara!, which also features an ensemble cast, good animation, and a vivid setting. This time, the setting is the Ikebukuro district of Tokyo. Life swirls around and through the many characters in a wonderful way.The characters seem fairly thin to me so far, and I'm not a huge fan of shounen fighting. But the characters bear watching, there is some mystery lurking, and the fights are certainly entertaining: one guy throws a trashcan a block through the air, and in another scene someone loses all his clothing as he is propelled up and across an intersection.The big surprise for me is the comedy Hanamaru Kindergarten. So far, the show is highly enjoyable, which seemed unlikely in a show featuring kindergarteners and their insecure new male teacher. Another surprise is that the show is directed by the director of Gundam00 and FMA1, Mizushima Seiji.This is not Kodomo no Jikan, which I think of as a show based on loli appeal that had a serious side, too. This is an innocent show, with delightful characters and its own kind of depth. However, it does star Shindou Kei, who was Kuro in KnJ.The most striking character is the childish genius played by Takagaki Ayahi, who continues to cement her position in the upper ranks of seiyuus. Last year, she performed in the ninth-highest number of episodes of any seiyuu.Nodame Cantabile Finale is having trouble getting going, through two episodes. Nodame's craziness seems less endearing; there is too little behind Chiaki's actions; and as in the second series, the music is not getting its due.But I continue to have high hopes, and am following the story closely.TV ratings started at 2.5%, a far cry from those of the first series, which doubled that; but episode two jumped to a highly respectable 3.7%Katanagatari just aired its first episode and was both good to look at and quite enjoyable to watch -- although it doesn't seem to me to be anywhere near the show Bakemonogatari was, which was also based on a novel by NisiOisiN. The character design and backgrounds are excellent, and the animation good.But somehow, director Motonaga Keitarou (Amaenaideyo, School Days) just doesn't seem to me to make the most of the material. There isn't much rhythm in the directing, and he doesn't get the best from a decent main cast: Tamura Yukari, Nakahara Mai, and Hosoya Yoshimasa (Juuzawa Juu in Denpateki na Kanojo).It's hard to know how popular the new Hidamari Sketch is, since there is no separate thread for it on 2channel, and TV ratings are not available. But this seems a worthy continuation of the series. It's beautiful and well-acted, but unfortunately it bores me. This season, we get a new character, called Nori, played by Harada Hitomi, an interesting new voice who played Tomoe in Sasameki Koto and is Himeji in Baka to Test.Actually, maybe Ladies versus Butlers is the most surprising show. It makes no pretense of being anything but a bishoujo fanservice comedy, and is by the staff that made Kanokon. But it is actually funny. The look and colors are delightful, the animation good, and the character design -- if you don't mind the absence of noses -- is excellent.And I find myself laughing out loud during every episode. They take common memes and do them well, pushing the humor just one stage further. Like the innocent clumsy maid (voiced by Koshimizu Ami) who comes into the shower to apologize for something by scrubbing the protagonist's back, and shows not the slightest embarrassment at all, advancing step by step as he contorts his body to hide. And we have a bit of mystery and some interesting human relations.Seikon no Qwaser fascinated me at the start, with its pseudo-Christian mythology and good voice-acting (Sanpei Yuuko, Fujimura Ayumi, Toyosaki Aki, Chihara Minori, Hirano Aya, Hikasa Youko, Kawasumi Ayako, Ookawa Tooru). But the censored version is so censored as to be incoherent, and the way they combine sex and violence in the uncensored version I find hard to take.The story involves a magical boy who gains power to fight by sucking "soma" from a virgin's breasts. But that's not the problem, really. It's a strong concept, if you just accept it as myth and don't hate it for being fanservice.Chuu-bra is the most unlikely show of all: about a girl who wants to help other girls wear the bras and panties that are right for their bodies, and starts an underwear club in her school. It's clear what the appeal is meant to be, lol. But in fact, the girl herself, and the situation, are interesting and quite well portrayed. I'm not a big fan of Chihara Minori's seiyuu work, but I think she does a good job here as the main girl. She makes her innocent and almost real. The show reminds me of Naishou no Tsubomi, overlaying its fanservice with some actual life-education.Ookamikakushi is the latest offering based on a story by Ryuukishi07, the creator of Higurashi. Strange town in the countryside -- check. Mysterious secret activities -- check. Dangerous-seeming loli -- check. Creepy male character caressing the young male protagonist's leg -- hey, wait, that's something new. It does seem like other Ryuukishi07 tales, but as with them, the story might actually have some interest. And there is something to the characters. Too bad the drawing, animation, and story-telling are so lame.Omamori Himari at first sight seems to have nothing at all going for it, and yet even it is amusing, if you like fanservice and moe. Shindou Kei reappears as the magic loli. Koshimizu Ami is a warrior cat-spirit speaking old Japanese. And Nomizu Iori (Nymph in Sora no Otoshimono) does a nice job as the childhood friend. But Hirakawa Daisuke is unbearable as the wimpy, excitable lead. The humor feels stale to me. And the drawing and animation are second-rate.Now for a few more words about Dance in the Vampire Bund. I can understand why some manga-readers wish it had followed the manga more closely. I can understand why some people object to a show its loli appeal. And I can understand why some people find Shinbou Akiyuki's direction too busy.But if you can speed yourself up to the Shaft/Shinbou visual pace, this show is just outstandingly well put together. The first episode was pretty outlandish, and I wasn't totally convinced myself. But the idea was to create a light environment as a background for the serious events that will come. And the tone of voice Yuuki Aoi used in her first appearance in the show was just riveting: slow, childish, uncertain, arch. Then she came forth as the powerful vampire queen. These contrasts were the point of the episode.Episode two, as I've written before, was amazing. The opening sequence was a classic, with its colorful vague images, the butterfly and flowers, the crying eye, rushing up the red carpet, the music, the voices. The way the boy's voice was timed to the butterfly landing on the flower, and the way Nakamura Yuuichi repeated exactly the same tone the second time he spoke. It was symphonic. All the timing was sharp and strong, penetrating the heart like music. And we ended with a clear feeling of the memories of the queen, her sadness and love for the kind little boy, and her present confidence, pre-eminence and strength.Throughout the episode, we had timing and images that worked like these, if less powerfully. The very next sequence, in the classroom, is another example, working rhythms with the music, images, and voices. And creating a wistful feeling with Saitou Chiwa's voiceover, Yuki's gaze, and the "high and distant" Ennico Morricone-like music in the background.An important part of the aesthetic here is irony. Using contrasts of seriousness and humor to keep us just a little distant from the action. So that we learn to accept dramatic scenes like the finale of episode two, with its emotional crescendos, and not feel that they are overdone. For some people, this apparently doesn't work. It's a fine line, I admit. But the show walks it well for me.And I like the strength of the mythic situations. The mythic contradictions of the powerful child-queen who is not a child. Her knight-errant fated from birth to serve her. His forgetting his own nature -- and then remembering it in response to her cry of despair. The queen who is a part of nature (her face in the shrubbery), but who is vulnerable to the sun (the protective gel). Mina Tepes the direct descendant of the original Dracula, Vlad Tepes. And by episode three, we have the terrifying mythic situation of monsters among us.There are many mesmerizing images, works of art in themselves. These tableaux can emphasize something about a situation or a character and give us a chance to feel them, or get a sense of immediacy by focusing on a small detail. Here are some examples:I'm a fan of Shinbou Akiyuki's work, although I haven't been able to finish many of his series. I loved Bakemonogatari, but Natsu no Arashi left me pretty cold. The gentle moe of Hidamari Sketch didn't sustain my interest long, and the humor of Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei isn't mine.What's the difference? The original material makes a big difference, and I did like this manga, at least into volume four. But I think the main difference may be the staff Shinbou has to help him here: he has a new assistant director (Sonoda Masahiro), a new animation director (Konno Naoyuki), a new writer (Yoshino Hiroyuki, who wrote Macross Frontier, Mai-HiME and My-Otome, and was assistant chief writer on Code Geass), and a new music director (Dobashi Akio). As far as I can tell, none of those have worked with him before, except for Sonoda, who worked on a couple of episodes of ef melodies, which Shinbou just supervised and didn't direct.I've gone on too long. In part, I'm trying to justify the show and my opinion of it to the many people who doubt its excellence. In part, I'm trying to understand why I like it, and convince myself. In that at least, I have succeeded.
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There often seems to be one new show that most people despise, but I think is outstanding.A couple of summers ago, it was Mahou Tsukai ni Taisetsu na Koto, which it seems only I thought was one of the best shows of 2008. Last fall, it was the hilarious and deep Seitokai no Ichizon, which was derided by its early reviewers. This season, the show in question is Dance in the Vampire Bund. (click images to enlarge)Posters on the show's AnimeSuki forum, and also many bloggers, have been enraged at the way the first episode bears no relation to the manga. They find the TV game show that is used to introduce the story quite stupid. They rail against the fuzzy drawing in the two episodes that have been aired so far. They repeat the common criticism of Shaft and director Shinbou Akiyuki that there are too many still frames and not enough actual animation. They ridicule the use of monsters and amnesia in the plot. They say the show is boring and trite.But after watching episode two, I consider this by far the most promising show of the season, with great visual art, excellent voice-acting, unusual story-telling, fascinating rhythms in the direction, interesting characters, and a romantic story with strong elements of myth.Japanese comments have been mixed, but nowhere near as negative as those in the West. Posters on the Japanese discussion board 2channel have compared the look of the show to shows of the 1980s and earlier. To me, it has echoes of the great German "proto-postmodern" artist Joseph Beuys and his school: dry, unemphatic, strange. The dramatic visual patterns of Shinbou's Bakemonogatari are still there, but muted and more complex. For me, Bakemonogatari took Shinbou to a new level, and this show -- or at least episode two -- is yet another step up.The rhythms of the scenes are brilliant. The deft interplay of sound and silence, image and blank screen in an early classroom scene in episode two is a masterpiece in itself, embodying the protagonist's unsettled state of mind in a way that moves like music.The basic situations are mythical: a queen of the vampires who looks like a child. A vampire island in Tokyo Harbor. A young man who has forgotten his true nature and his life's purpose. A spider/vampire who restrains the queen from crossing the water to her home, but whose attack on the hero releases him from his amnesia and launches him on his true path. The monster spider is like the guardian who blocks the start of the Hero's Journey in classic myth.And mythic images keep appearing: the head poking out of a tiny window in a school wall is like some subterranean or subconscious god. The little queen's face peeking out of the shrubbery shows her integration with the power of the natural world.There is a sequence in episode two where the queen, Mina Tepes, wears the Noh mask of a woman's vengeful ghost and gives a brief Noh-like performance introducing her real vampire nature: "First, drink the lifeblood of humans. Second, live a free life in an immortal body. Third, destroy anyone who interferes with my world." For me, this is a memorable 20 seconds of animation: script, image, and voice.Vampires have always embodied forbidden sexuality. The queen is really the age of an adult, but appears so far in the form of a pre-pubescent child. The scene in which the hero rubs protective gel on her half-naked body is forbidden sexuality for our time, a time when most other forms of sexuality are considered perfectly okay.This aspect of the anime is one that does justify people in shutting it off in horrified disapproval, if that is what they feel.Her apparent age aside, the love story between the queen and her hero is already quite moving: she is searching for the boy who comforted her years ago and promised to protect her. When she comes to him, he has lost his memory. But at a time of crisis, he instinctively tries to protect her and suddenly remembers everything, and they are reunited in joyful tears. Meanwhile, the human girl who also loves him says, in a voiceover: "This is the story of a promise, a fairy tale about a great demon queen and the young man who offered her everything. A story of love, both beautiful and evanescent."People who came to this expecting a shounen anime featuring vampires and fighting may find the emphasis on romantic myth less than ideal. Even if they just expected a faithful adaptation of the manga, they will be justifiably disappointed. The mangaka himself, Tamaki Nozomu, has approved the re-imagining of his manga and is working closely with the director, Shinbou Akiyuki (Tsukuyomi Moonphase, PaniPoni Dash, Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei, Bakemonogatari, etc.), and the lead writer, Yoshino Hiroyuki (Mai-HiME, Macross Frontier, Denpateki na Kanojo, So·Ra·No·Wo·To).Realism plays little part here. We have attack helicopters strafing the streets of Tokyo with no apparent response from the authorities. We have a hero being dashed against a building with great force and surviving. And so on. But this is myth, not reality. I have always believed that anime does myth best.The voice-acting is really outstanding. Seventeen-year-old Yuuki Aoi (Murasaki in Kurenai) as Mina Tepes demonstrates why she is getting so many and such varied roles. She can be commanding and distraught in equal measure. She can scream and she can whisper. It is amusing to hear her in the totally different role of Ichigo, the aspiring young pastry-maker in the excellent little girls' anime Yumeiro Patissière. Mina is about the most varied character imaginable, ranging from vulnerable child to romantic heroine to confident queen to vicious and athletic vampire.The hero, Akira, is played with a beautiful gentle strength by Nakamura Yuuichi, who was Alto in Macross Frontier and Graham Akers in Gundam00.And Saitou Chiwa, who gave last year's best seiyuu performance, as Senjougahara in Bakemonogatari, returns as Yuki, the girl whom Akira leaves behind. And also in the important role of narrator.But what most strikes me about this show is the ironic but powerful way the story is being told. There is a lightness that makes it seem as if some things are just being tossed off. Drama is not artificially induced. But somehow the feelings of the characters come through vividly.The first episode -- which many are now calling "episode 00" -- introduced the situation by way of a cheesy Japanese TV panel show discussing whether vampires were real. The show was thrown in chaos by the revelation that one of the panelists was a vampire himself. He transformed into a ludicrous reptilian monster and then was killed by a glance from the tiny queen, who had been pretending to be an audience member. Serious events happen, but surrounded by bizarre humor.The story is told with great economy. Each sequence has a meaning, and the links are brief and not explicit. Instead, there can be a punctuation of short scenes from elsewhere in the narrative: such as when we see a series of still scenes around the school, informing us that the afternoon has passed.The still scenes work wonderfully well for me. But many people hate it when the screen is still, and say it is not real animation. For me, the still scenes can be drawn with more art and care than an animated sequence, and that has a force of its own. They are certainly a way for the director to save money in the production, which for me is a good thing, since it allows him to make money and therefore more shows.The music is by Dobashi Akio, who was the keyboardist for the group Rebeccca in the 1980s, is a well-known music producer and DJ in Japan, and did music for the Wellber shows and Yozakura Quartet. The music is quite odd, and often used to undercut the message of a scene, either by trivializing it or working directly against it. This is a technique I usually find quite effective, to keep a scene from being too heavy or blunt.The OP song is enjoyable, a cover by Nakano Aiko of the song "Friends," a big hit for Dobashi and Rebecca in the 1980s, used here apparently by special request of the mangaka. The visual rhythms are excellent in the OP animation, which was storyboarded and directed by assistant director ("series director") Sonoda Masahiro. He is a veteran key animator and episode director who has directed many episodes of various animes, including Welcome to the NHK, Di Gi Charat Nyo, Scrapped Princess, and some Galaxy Angel shows. He also storyboarded and directed episode 2.The OP includes a passionate dance at faster than human speed by Mina Tepes, wearing next to nothing. It is an index the "dangerousness" (to quote the Moonphase blog) of the animation that I will not post it here. Look it up on YouTube, if you want. Some posters on the Japanese discussion board 2channel think it is the best OP of the season. So do I.The art director is Azuma Kouji, who got his start in hentai, as art director in a couple of Bible Black anime, but has recently become a close collaborator of Shinbou and Oonuma Shin, having done many episodes of ef melodies, as well as being art director of both Natsu no Arashi series and the current Baka to Test.The overall animation director is Konno Naoyuki, the director and animation director of 009-1, a fanservicey adventure show that looked great, whatever else it lacked.A note about the title: bund in German means an association or league. But that is not its meaning here. In the period around a hundred years ago when Britain occupied Shanghai, the main waterfront area there was known as "The Bund." This comes from the Urdu word band, which means an embankment or dam. The connection to this show is that an artificial island rising from Tokyo Harbour is occupied by the vampire nation.Will the show continue to impress me? We shall see. But since one writer is doing all the episodes, and the director/storyboarder of episode two is the man who will direct more episodes than anyone else, I expect the quality to keep coming. At least for me.
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夏のあらし���春夏冬中 ReviewSummer Storm! Open for BusinessSHAFT is always hit-or-miss when it comes to comedy anime titles. When they get a hit, they can knock the ball out of the ballpark. When they miss, it can be so bad sometimes as to have the bat fly out of their hands, sail into the stands, and whack multiple people in the crowd as it moves like a boomerang. Such is the case with Natsu no Arashi!
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The second season of that Natsu no Arashi cartoon concluded a little while ago, and it had a pretty awesome last episode! In retrospect, the whole show was pretty good, but what held it back was a smattering of okay to downright dumb episodes in the middle. Something that had me confused for a while was [...]
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夏のあらし���春夏冬中 Episode 13 Review Summer Storm! Open for Business Ep. 13 (Final Episode)SPOILER Summary/Synopsis: Hajime works on a story where five years in the future, Arashi kisses him as completion of her promise after he helped her when she was a child. In the present, Master has Murata bring in a case of kiwi fruit, leading Hajime to decide to pull a prank on Takeshi for flirting with Arashi so
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夏のあらし���春夏冬中 Episode 12 ReviewSummer Storm! Open for Business Ep. 12 SPOILER Summary/Synopsis: A female manga-ka visits Hakobune and when Yayoi goes to serve her, the manga-ka speaks of kissing. This shocks the ghost-girls so Arashi heads over to set this manga-ka straight, only to be taken aback by the girl's apparent strong desire to kiss. Eventually, she explains that her desire is to capture
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