anime

[Gormongous]

The anime itself I didn't find horrifying or tense in any way. Watching Another was just kind of depressing to me. Especially the trainwreck of a finale. 

 

Yeah, I wouldn't have gone to bat for it at all, except that she was calling it a poor man's Final Destination, which sells it too short by half. Deep character dive Another is not, but there was at least some thought going into the plot.

 

I can't think of the last anime that really scared me. Some moments in Monster gave me brief existential discomfort, but nothing that would ever have kept me up at night.

[Codicier]

I've always bounced quite badly off the whole supernatural horror mystery thing. My first exposure to that sub genre was Higurashi When They Cry, which i absolutely loathed despite the fact at the time everyone seemed to love it.

Since then I've been unable to shift the impression that the core of the whole genre is a highly contrived conceit that it is these characters fate to suffer, not because they are part a convincingly uncaring world, not because their own actions and the natural progression of their story arc leads them there, but simply because the creator likes to watch them suffer.

 

Speaking of which i just watched the 3rd of the Berserk remakes, and ugh i don't think I've watched such a uneven piece of work for a long time.

Gormongous your absolutely right when you comment on the battle scenes occasionally dropping to sub PS2 level rendering at times, but on the other hand i love the way they have chosen to draw Guts.

Traditionally hes always been drawn all hard lines & spiky where as the golden age version is far softer and more rounded. He actually looks young!

As for the story ..... i really think i am getting to old for this shit, and there are a few scenes i find particularly troublesome in a way i don't remember feeling with the manga or previous anime adaptation. 

[tegan]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Iy83pwj33i8

[TheLastBaron]

Have we already discussed the live action HBO adaptation of Monster in this thread?  I totally forgot about it until I was browsing Guillermo del Toro's Wikipedia page after I watched Pacific Rim.

[Gormongous]

Jin-Roh's getting a Blu-ray rerelease after Discotek rescued the license! Finally, one of the two rarest and most expensive Blu-rays ever released in the US (the last eBay auction I saw for one six months ago ended at $999 and a copy on Amazon is going for $1,250) is overthrown.

 

Discotek's come out of nowhere the past couple years, haven't they? I know they specialize in DVD rereleases of seventies and eighties anime, but lately they've been doing rescues of pretty big series from recently: Golden Boy, Diebuster, GTO, and now Jin-Roh. Looks like they're a company to watch now.

 

Have we already discussed the live action HBO adaptation of Monster in this thread?  I totally forgot about it until I was browsing Guillermo del Toro's Wikipedia page after I watched Pacific Rim.

 

Wow, really? Is there any more information than just that they're doing one? I really disliked Monster, but a good adaptation could cut out most of the bloat that killed that anime for me.

 

The big question is, do they have the gumption to keep the main character Japanese? I don't know if the language-barrier-cum-sore-thumb scenario would work as well with an American or Brit...

[tegan]

I only ever read the first volume of Monster, but I'm really tempted to go back to it now that I know that Urasawa put Tezuka characters into it, seemingly for no reason.

[Barnastyz]

I only ever read the first volume of Monster, but I'm really tempted to go back to it now that I know that Urasawa put Tezuka characters into it, seemingly for no reason.

 

Monster is one of the few animes that I've watched a fair bit of. (Besides DBZ when I was a kid!). I really like the European Post-Cold War setting a lot and the protagonist and antagonist are both super interesting. It's just kind of slow, there's only so much you can do besides either  

Kill Johan or figure out the mystery of his past.

. I forget how many episodes there are but I remember one thing, there are definitely too many.

 

Oh

 

Are you ready for the best DBZ joke ever?

 

Q: How many Super Saiyans does it take to screw in a lightbulb?

 

A: 

One, but it takes 5 episodes!

[Tanukitsune]

Since I'm leaving for a trip for a few weeks, and I'll have a 3G USB modem, I decided to give the Crunchyroll two week trial a go. Does anybody have any good light hearted or more comedic shows to suggest?

 

The one about Japanese folklore seems cute?

[Codicier]

Since I'm leaving for a trip for a few weeks, and I'll have a 3G USB modem, I decided to give the Crunchyroll two week trial a go. Does anybody have any good light hearted or more comedic shows to suggest?

 

The one about Japanese folklore seems cute?

 

Do you just want suggestions for shows from this season? or does the season not matter as long as you can stream it on crunchyroll?

[Tanukitsune]

Hmm, I will be away for almost three weeks, and if there is anything left I can always watch it later?

[Codicier]

Ok just gonna throw stuff at you & hope that some of it sticks..

 

http://www.crunchyroll.com/the-eccentric-family

Certainly ticks the light-hearted box, it's not amazingly funny nor is it art especially notable(although its certainly more than competent) but very energetic and caries it's audience along nicely while building some interesting plot threads (so far).

 

http://www.crunchyroll.com/my-little-monster

Pretty sure we have covered this one before. Totally unoriginal concept but all in all ends up being a solid example of its genre, with somelikeable characters 

 

http://www.crunchyroll.com/humanity-has-declined

Incredibly hit & miss with its humour and your reaction to it well may depend on how you feel about the very slow pace it takes.

 

http://www.crunchyroll.com/kids-on-the-slope

JAZZ

 

also completely insubstantial but enjoyable are:

http://www.crunchyroll.com/hanasaku-iroha

http://www.crunchyroll.com/chihayafuru

 

there's also 

http://www.crunchyroll.com/monogatari

which wasn't available in my region & who's worth entirely depends on if you can forgive Shaft's fanservice tendencies in return for their superb artistry or not. 

[Tanukitsune]

Damn, only the first show in that list is available in my region. Oh well, it's better than nothing.

[Gormongous]

Damn, only the first show in that list is available in my region. Oh well, it's better than nothing.

 

I'll weigh in, then.

 

Arakawa Under the Bridge: Silly Shaft show about a rich boy being indebted to a homeless girl.

 

Chi's Sweet Home: Two-minute comedy shorts about a curious kitten. Heartbreakingly cute.

 

Gintama: Absurdist period comedy about a former samurai handyman. I can't give my full recommendation because I haven't finished it, it's so long.

 

Lucky Star: Cute high school girls doing cute high school things. Pretty funny, despite.

 

Seitokai no Ichizon: Parody anime about a guy who wants to make the all-girl student council his harem. A hard sell for most, but I like it.

 

Squid Girl: A squid becomes a little girl to take revenge on humanity, gets distracted in funny ways.

 

Wagnaria!!: A guy starts working at a restaurant to get with a girl, meets another instead. God, the characters are annoying, but the show's a good time.

 

I'm an awful person, Tanukitsune. I couldn't remember if you'd seen Gurren Lagann. I also left off stuff like Fist of the North Star which is nominally serious but hard to take seriously.

[Tanukitsune]

Wow, the only show available from that list I have available is Squid Girl, which I've already seen.

 

I think I posted my thoughts on the sequel to Gurren Lagann and I saw Fist of the North Star back in the day.

 

Geez, I guess it's much better in other countries, and yet it's still better than our equivalent of Netflix. :|

[Gormongous]

Do you know the licensing situation in Spain? It might just be that there aren't many companies there licensing anime series, so Crunchyroll can't stream them. If so, that sucks. The Bandai blowout still has me so damn nervous about a lot of my favorite shows, I can't imagine not being able to watch the majority of anime legally.

 

 

EDIT: It's extra weird that Lucky Star isn't available in your country. That's the third-biggest KyoAni property, surely it's worth someone's time to pick it up.

[Tanukitsune]

I have no idea, by I do know that the piracy in my country is ridiculous and I don't really see that many anime DVDs or on TV. What happened with Bandai? 

 

It's kinda strange, the shows I can watch, apart from Naruto and a few others, are show I've never heard of and I can't image my country would rather get a license of them instead of something like the Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya.

[tegan]

Is Dennou Coil on Crunchyroll? Because everyone needs to watch Dennou Coil.

 

It totally counts as a comedy if you only watch the beard civilizations episode over and over again.

[Gormongous]

I have no idea, by I do know that the piracy in my country is ridiculous and I don't really see that many anime DVDs or on TV. What happened with Bandai? 

 

It's kinda strange, the shows I can watch, apart from Naruto and a few others, are show I've never heard of and I can't image my country would rather get a license of them instead of something like the Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya.

 

Bandai Entertainment was the international distribution arm for visual media from Bandai Visual. They had a weird parent/child relationship with each other that boiled down to a very Japanese way of doing business. Bandai Visual let other companies bid on distribution licenses for their anime titles, but then forced Bandai Entertainment to bid whatever it took to beat them all, because Bandai Visual wanted to make money from licensing deals but didn't want any licenses to go out-of-house. This made them big bucks with Gundam in the eighties, but they took a bath with every other anime ever. When Bandai Entertainment had to put in an insane bid for K-On! that pretty much guaranteed they would never make a profit (and they didn't), Bandai Visual got all huffy and had them pull out of the North American market entirely. All production stopped, all licenses lapsed, and a lot of the best anime of the nineties and noughties are in short supply until FUNimation or Sentai picks them up. It's a real tragedy, but we survived pretty much the same thing with Geneon, so I don't know.

 

I'd guess that you're seeing a lot of no-name shows because, after the anime bubble, there's a common practice of selling "packages" of less desirable anime in the hopes that the distribution of risk over multiple titles will tempt licensers to bite. Haruhi Suzumiya is KyoAni and a huge hit, so it's expensive and hence risky to buy it alone, especially because it's fairly smart seinen and a lot of companies are always worried that the popularity won't translate. Which leads me to...

 

Is Dennou Coil on Crunchyroll? Because everyone needs to watch Dennou Coil.

 

Dennou Coil is not licensed. Dennou Coil will never be licensed. The system is broken.

[Codicier]

Is Dennou Coil on Crunchyroll? Because everyone needs to watch Dennou Coil.

 

It totally counts as a comedy if you only watch the beard civilizations episode over and over again.

 I think it might have actually been on there at one time, (but that may be my memory playing up)but what seems to happen with CR most of the time is a series generally gets pulled from the catalogue if it isn't ongoing & has come out on DvD in that region

 

I didn't mention

http://www.crunchyroll.co.uk/Durarara

because its been around for a while but if it works you should check it out although its has a almost schizophrenic tendency to swap between light-heartedness and a more dark tone.

[Tanukitsune]

Well, I tested a video on Crunchy on a whim and...

 

 

Sharks make everything better... or so terrible it's the best thing ever, which is also good.

 

Is this the guy who did the art fro Motor Toon Gran Prix and Maximo? 

 

Guys, I'm totally OK with them being forced to buy shows in packages if this is the "quality" stuff they get stuck with. 

[Twig]

what

[Ucantalas]

So, I guess this doesn't really fit with the other, high quality anime people are talking about here (and I debated posting about this in the Cartoons thread...) but yesterday I discovered that the old seasons of Digimon are on (canadian) Netflix.

So, for the past two days, I have been doing nothing but watch Digimon. I made it to after they defeat Venommyotismon and save the real world (so about 40 episodes in), and I just have to say... I am pleasantly surprised. I expected this to be one of those shows that nostalgia had hyped up in my mind to the point of it actually being unwatchably bad (like, for instance, Sonic Underground or Pokemon). Luckily, it's actually held up a lot better than some of the shows I watched as a kid.

I also like that there is some sort of overall storyline and goal for the characters, as opposed to Pokemon, which often finds the characters just sort of wandering around. It also has far fewer filler episodes than Pokemon (and yes, a lot of my thoughts are comparing it to Pokemon, which I also watched a lot as a kid, and which I also recently started rewatching). But I just can't help but feel like the entire digivolution and class system (Rookie, Champion, Ultimate, etc) are all just pulled out of the creator's asses and changed whenever they need to just to fit the story.

[Twig]

Monster Rancher was the best of those kinds of shows!

 

He says speaking from a memory now over a decade (?) old.

[Ucantalas]

I don't remember much of Monster Rancher, but I know I remember the theme song. And it was great.

...which brings up another point: I am starting to hate the Digimon theme. It plays a clip of the song every time someone digivolves. And in some episodes, that can be up to 6 or 7 times. It gets grating after a while.

[Gormongous]

But I just can't help but feel like the entire digivolution and class system (Rookie, Champion, Ultimate, etc) are all just pulled out of the creator's asses and changed whenever they need to just to fit the story.

 

This is honestly the best part of rewatching Yu-Gi-Oh!, whether in full or abridged form. Duel Monsters seems to be a card game exclusively won by cheating, which is even more awesome when you realized that the anime at least was made to promote an actual card game with a fairly extensive set of rules. It's like everyone in the show is ten years old and derives their self-worth from winning at a children's card game, no matter how.