Spring 2010 First Impressions
Posted: April 8, 2010 Filed under: Uncategorized 31 Comments »
Omitted: Mayoi Neko Overrun (I might put it on here later), Rainbow (subs where??), other stuff
Quadrant I
Arakawa Under the Bridge is this season’s clear winner. Despite how 4-komaish it felt (yes, I know the original material is not a 4-koma) with those… card things in-between scenes/gags, the humor was very, very good. I don’t think any company but SHAFT could’ve pulled this one off. Yes, the ahoge thing and the shows-top-half-of-face thing were done before (Bakemonogatari), but that doesn’t make it any less great. Hell, watching that ahoge droop down after Nino went into the drawer was the funniest thing I’ve seen so far this year.
Given how boring Bakemonogatari was (for me, at least) and how shoddy a job Bund turned out to be, I wasn’t expecting a great SHAFT series this season. Holy shit.
Senkou no Night Raid is a series that took me by surprise. I love A-1’s work with mellow anime like Kannagi and Sora no Woto (I’ll get to Working!! later…), but when it comes to action (Fairy Tail, Valkyria Chronicles), I loathe their works. Heck, I hate most action shows (mecha unincluded). Black Lagoon and Baccano are the only two action shows I actually liked.
Senkou no Night Raid held a strange appeal to me. It was unlike all the other action shows I’ve given up on, but with the powers, the appealing character designs and artwork, and the promise of a great plot (possibly episodic), I’m more than willing to follow the show.
Also, the Chinese sucks.
B Gata H Kei… In a nutshell, this show is good, but shows very little promise. The first episode was great, of course, but there is so little room for following episodes to be humorous that I’m not sure if I want to keep on watching. I’d rather keep this fond memory of a funny, decent show than having to watch it deteriorate into a trashy romantic comedy.
Giant Killing is very inspiring. Most sports anime are inspiring, but few can hit that level with the first episode. Even fewer can keep it up, but I have high expectations of Giant Killing. Heck, I just want to see Tatsumi’s badassery kick in already. Show those bastard fans what you’re made of!
Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou is “most surprising” for a reason. As you may know, I hate fanservice, ecchi, etc. with a passion. I just don’t understand why you would watch a series with all this flashing when you could be watching straight-out hentai/porn or something actually good like Mushishi. No, this doesn’t mean I’m changing my stance on fanservice/ecchi (I watched the censored version, anyway). I’m just surprised that an ecchi anime like Ichiban toolongofatitle no Daimaou can actually have good quality humor and a promising story. My guilty pleasure for this season.
Hakuouki is full of pretty men. And those pretty men remind me of the Gintama Shinsengumi. I spent the episode wowing at the art, animation, and how much Kondo acts like Gorilla Stalker. I’m pretty sure I’ll drop this show, but the first episode left me with a decent impression.
Kaichou wa Maid-sama is just what I expected it to be. What I didn’t expect, though, is that I don’t hate it. I read the first few chapters of the manga, and gave up in disgust. After the initial “oh, she’s a maid?” (which in itself isn’t that appealing…) there’s nothing left. Just a bunch of predictable shoujo crap. Maybe it’s better animated, I don’t know? I’ll be watching a few more episodes to see if the predictable shoujo crap turns up again.
Quadrant II
Angel Beats, Angel Beats… I really had a hard time placing this show on my graph. It was really good, but also not that good. It was shocking, but not very surprising at the same time. In the end, I just stuck it here. I can’t remember why.
I guess I’ll start with the pros. Interesting story/setting, nice theme(s), good characters, Haruhi, and Brock (Guns? Pfft. Where’s your Onix?).
Cons? Wannabe Kyon, concert, bad character designs (dem eyes), not very funny when it tries to be, shows little promise (really, where can the plot go?).
Yuri is a really nice character. Very reminiscent of Haruhi, but that’s definitely a good thing. On the other hand, Otonashi is no Kyon. His straight man act needs some cleaning up.
K-ON!! had some really good things going for it in this episode. Too bad they were drowned out by large amounts of moeshit and forced humor. The opening scene was really, really good. It’s the best opening to a second season I’ve ever seen (sounds less than impressive, but I assure you, I loved it). And then came that eardrum-shattering OP. How come the animation was so impressive when the music was so bad…?
The episode itself had some really funny parts (“copying homework” was great), but things like moe-fying Ritsu (something that the first season almost never did, unless it was Ritsu teasing Mio), making Mio suddenly moe+crying (take some tips from Kagami, yo), and worst of all, Mio imagining Azusa “lonely” covered up any vestiges of good humor. Hell, if you don’t think that last example was forced, you’re a failure of a human being. That was so terrible I hate it I hate it I hate it I hat-
What’s worse, besides the humor, there was nothing but preachypreachypreachy stuff, and it didn’t work at all. I don’t think anybody wants to watch Azusa struggling over this situation (and apparently, KyoAni realized that too, and put in extra moeshit humor in an attempt to keep the audience entertained).
By the way, the ED was good. Not too hot on the outfits, but at least the animation looked better than the first season ED. The music was also better.
Quadrant III
Don’t judge based on appearances… don’t judge based on appeara-
F-F-F-F-FFFUUUUUUU-
Heroman is a complete failure of an anime in my book. Blah blah giant robot blah simple blah OH WAIT, THIS SHOW SUCKS. Exaggerated character designs and hermaphrodites are the least of Heroman’s problems. I think this show is stupid. It’s really stupid. Stupid stupid stupid. Heroman is stupid. Joey Jones is stupid. The evil cockroach aliens are stupid. The birds living in that afro are stupid.
On a different note, read Snark’s post. The captions are hilarious and he makes a good argument (even though I totally disagree because Heroman is stupid).
Working!!? More like Shitting!! This show displays all that is wrong about slice-of-life comedies. I can’t bring myself to defend the genre because this show is so bad and so wrong in so many ways. There is no background. The male lead just comes in and who is he I don’t know what the hell. The loli-looking character needs a haircut. None of the jokes are funny. I dropped the episode halfway through.
Yutori-chan is an interesting show. The art is terrible, but the characters look pretty good. The humor is just the same jokes over and over and over agai- Actually, pretend I moved that dot on the graph down quite a bit. This isn’t even worth talking about.
Quadrant IV
Kiss X Sis was shockingly bad. It really was. The OVA was pretty entertaining, but this first episode of the TV series was over-the-top and predictable (more so than usual, anyway). You can count on me watching the last OVA episode, but finishing the TV series? Not a chance.
Re: K-ON!!’s OP
I guess they’re just trying to demonstrate how bad they can make Yui’s voice go. As if her normal voice wasn’t annoying enough…
Everything else pretty much confirms what I’ve been hearing and it looks like Arakawa just might win it for show of the season unless it flops in its current pace.
K-ON!!’s OP is one of the worst songs I’ve ever heard. It’s terribad. Territerrible. Terrihorrendous.
Arakawa is the only real “great” show this season, even if there are a lot of “good” ones. 🙁
Not really interested in Hakuouki (or any anime this season), but it does have some cute fanart already.
K-on! is and always will be moe. Nothing more or less. I don’t think the preaching will be continuing either.
Heheh, this season’s actually pretty average for me… even if my chart makes it seem otherwise. This past year has been filled with average seasons, come to think of it. I guess Fall 2008 was the end of anime’s golden age.
I think K-ON!! is K-ON! moehanced. There’s even more than before. Maybe KyoAni realized that moe sells, and more moe sells even better…
Yeah, the preaching is probably limited to the first and last episodes, but I found it annoying anyway. D:
Agree with Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou since I hate ecchi shit but I found myself actually enjoying this one.
Arakawa definitely the clear winner. It was that obvious.
Oofuri comes second.
On Ichiban Ushiro no Daimaou: I think it was the way we heard the male lead’s thoughts. It’s just so ridiculous how bad his life gradually becomes, and to top it off, we get to listen to him trying to fix it and failing!
Arakawa is awesome. I had my doubts about it, but seeing Nino helping the village chief fix his zipper… oh god, that was funny.
Never watched the first season of Oofuri. It just seemed too ordinary a sports anime to me.
Oofuri fans UNITE!
Though I’m glad to have Giant Killing to sample this season too –
Hmmn. Oofuri better than Giant Killing?
Maybe I’ll take it up, though I usually end up getting tired of sports anime after a few episodes.
Giant Killing is pretty good though I hope there isn’t too much engrish.
I think Heroman can be done well. The plot and characters sounded shitty and everything looked terrible until I watched the first episode. I was surprised how well everything was executed, the show caught my attention even though it had quite a lot of flaws. I’m watching to see where it leads me, if it goes straight into the gutter then I’ll drop it but if it does this correctly then I’ll probably like it.
Senko no Night raid is great. Taking from Darker than Black and Baccano is a pretty smart thing to do.
K-On should die already.
Ugh nevermind about Heroman. 2nd episode reveals how shitty a show can get.
In Giant Killing, I couldn’t even tell what the woman was trying to say. Thank god they got a (semi?)fluent English speaker to voice the old guy, though…
I’m not even gonna watch the second episode of Heroman.
Oh, forgot to mention Darker than Black. That show was pretty great. Senkou no Night Raid just might turn out great.
Yes, K-ON should die.
Bah, Heroman is awesome, and I will punch the faces of people who think otherwise.
That said however, I think we can both find common ground in the fact that Joey Jones is a little bitch with the voice of a woman.
I think Joey Jones is a reverse trap. It’s probably a woman.
I think Will should be the main character. He’s manly. Yup.
I really liked Arakawa, the animation is intense without being overwhelming. I thought the characters were hilarious. Nino cracks me up because she seems like she just barely is interested in what is going on, despite being personally involved.
Giant Killing might grow on me, but I want to see how they handle real field action, so I’ll have a better feel for it next week.
Night Raid was not that exciting to me. I was more entertained by the humor in Angel Beats, although the powers in Night Raid were imaginatively presented.
Hakuouki looked pretty good. hopefully a decent plot will emerge, and we’ll get some decent fights. If so it’ll be worth keeping.
Heroman was everything I expected it to be. Genericman would have been a more accurate title.
Nino’s blank stare is brilliant, huh? I just love the deadpan humor.
Giant Killing is pretty good so far, but there’s not much “sports” yet, so I guess we’re just going to have to see.
Night Raid presented the powers pretty well… but it didn’t explain them. Why doesn’t that guy want to teleport, anyway? Angel Beats’ humor didn’t strike that same chord with me. I found it like Haruhi, but much less so. Kyon’s witty comments just aren’t there…
Hakuouki might turn out actiony, but I doubt it. It might go full-blown otome, since it’s from the girl’s point of view.
Heroman was so predictable. I don’t know why people are entertained by what they already know is going to happen.
But Working!! is awesome.
pfft.
“I just don’t understand why you would watch a series with all this flashing when you could be watching straight-out hentai/porn or something actually good like Mushishi”
Pretentious…I mean, QFT
Also thank you for shitting on Working. That show is really fucking poor and yet there’s those out there who think it’s great. For all its problems, K-ON is still far better than Working
Oops, should’ve put Lucky Star there. 🙂
Working is truly a bad show. I don’t even know why somebody would want to watch it. K-ON! at least makes me laugh (well, sometimes). Working makes me cry.
K-On and Angel beats maybe had too much expectation. Heroman… well, with Joey jones…mmm Im speechless.
Speechless is one way to put it! D:
1) Kiss X Sis is SURPRISINGLY bad? No no no no no. The OVA’s were horrendous. I hated the OVAs and tried to give the first episode a chance, but instead I found it more constructive to put my arm in a blender. An arm will heal (I hope), but memories can’t be erased.
I do like the manga though. I actually find it funny, and it’s also much less focused on the blatant fanservice shit, like putting up hearts on the screen every time a sister kisses him on the cheek. That shit should die.
2) K-On? I kicked a cloud’s ass.
3) B Gata H Kei is gonna get good, and I base this on nothing other than the fact that I’m actually writing episode reviews for it, and I don’t do that shit for anything. It’s a great show.
4) SHAFT and Shinbo finally get back on track. Bakemonogatari was (or for me is) completely boring (at least the Snail arc was…I’m 2 episodes into the Monkey Paw arc and I’m actually liking it for some reason, maybe because it has a lesbian in it, and she’s awesome, and that fucking little kid isn’t in it. What a stupid kid, If I were Araragi I would beat her ass….oh wait, he already does that).
Hey, the Kiss X Sis OVA knew what it was delivering: really ecchi, borderline hentai material. The TV series tries to explain this material, and fails. It’s like trying to explain why the character in Queen’s Blade are dressed so skimpily (or not at all) – there is no rational explanation behind it!
K-ON! should die.
B Gata H Kei’s second episode was actually pretty damn good. I might change my mind about this series, though it’s still in very dangerous territory…
Bakemonogatari was complete shit, except for the Nadeko arc because I love Nadeko. And because that annoying Senjougahearahhaha wasn’t there for once! I really hate that girl.
Joey Jones is quite annoying so far. I have trouble about his ambiguous gender as well, especially for the first episode. Who designed his clothes anyway?
(but for the overall impression, I’ll wait a few more episodes before I judge it)
Joey Jones is just so unappealing a character that I can’t continue watching the show. Of course, having giant robot and cockroach alien designs that look like that don’t help either…
Based on what everyone says about Working!! I feel weird for actually liking it. Like I’m missing what makes it horrendous. I don’t think it’s the best 4koma adaptation ever, but I’ve also seen worse things.
I’ve also seen worse things, but never a slice of life comedy as shoddily done as Working!!. I think it was the male lead’s lack of background that determined it for me. The comedy was pretty generic, but to have a background-less male lead is unacceptable. It’s like he doesn’t matter (and really, he doesn’t…)
I guess the problem for me is I have seen shoddier. Granted, that doesn’t mean I won’t drop Working!! in the future, but for now, it’s bearable. If they never develop the male lead though, I will not be happy.
A male lead that matters? Don’t be silly. Men have no place in anime. :PPP
K-On!!’s new OP is annoying. It sounds inhuman, really really high and squeaky to listen for long.
And yes, as Janette says Men have no place in anime. Seldom do you see an anime where the man takes charge and is kick-ass awesome. Usually he’s just this really kind guy or someone who is excommunicated from the plot, a la narrator.
And yeah, Working!! was shoddily done. The lead , apparently, is a non-descript Average Joe who we’re supposed to watch for 12 episodes. I suppose the ones who would make it more interesting to watch would be the other characters.
HEROMAN was kind of annoying, like that Ben 10 show my brother watches. The plot lacks sense, the military is completely useless, because they included what seems to be pre-2000 war technologies, sans the atomic and nuclear weapons. Furthermore HEROMAN can just operate himself, can’t he? It’s not like he follows Joey’s commands much. So why not just leave him on for the entire day and let him go around and pwn all the aliens? Makes more sense than bringing him around to wait for what? Hell on earth?
Heroman is definitely kind of a throwback to the old superhero cartoons, but I would rate it as kind of bad nevertheless.
Working!!, I would place it right in the center- neither good or bad.
K-On!! actually seems to be nicer this season. (The horror.)
Arakawa is funny, it might catch up to Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei’s legacy of SHAFT comedy.
Angel Beats looks quite okay from the get-go.
B Gata H Kei is not as shallow as it looks- it won’t be 12 episodes about sluts, I’m quite sure about that.