Summer Pilots: Aoi Hana (and a rant about gender roles in anime romance)

Hi guys, it’s Menma.  I didn’t die, probably.  At Tekky’s urging, I chose a summer series to cover, and that’ll be Aoi Hana (“Blue Flowers”).  As far as I can tell, it’s a shoujo-ai slice of life drama, about two childhood friends who are reunited in high school and find themselves drawn to each other romantically.  From what I can see it’ll be a slow, bittersweet journey, set against that kind of watercolor background that makes you weirdly nostalgic for places you’ve never been (or maybe you have, but I haven’t).

In terms of sight and sound, Aoi Hana is very pretty.  A lot of the time the art, especially the background, looks like rough sketches, but in a good way.  The scenery, all watery greens and beiges and blues, and the soft piano music in the background, make you feel like you’re in one of those serene cities from a Ghibli movie.  Think Mimi wo Sumaseba or Majo no Takkyuubin.  Yes, it’s that nostalgic Ghibli feeling.  The character designs even feel Ghibli-like.  I’m sure that as soon as I publish this someone will say “Hey Menma how did you not know that Aoi Hana was made by Ghibli” or something and then I’ll feel silly.  But anyway, if you like Ghibli, you’ll like the feel of this series.

Spring Pilots: Shinkyouku Soukai Polyphonica Crimson S

This episode was really a mix of good and bad.  And when I say that, I don’t mean there were good and bad elements of the show, I mean most of the elements have good parts and bad parts: characters, animation and production quality, and setting.  While I can’t deny that I’m interested and will probably watch more episodes, the odds of me completing this show is really up in the air.

Spring Pilots: Tayutama -kiss on my deity-

… if someone had seen me while I was watching this episode, they probably would’ve thought that I have Parkinson’s Disease, because I was twitching that much.  Maybe I was unconsciously affected by watching Basquash and Eden right before this, but Tayutama had, by FAR, the worst first episode of the year (to date).  It was honestly, just one huge mess.  (WARNING: Contains profanity)

Spring Pilots: Basquash!

… Why oh WHY didn’t watch this earlier, like when it came out.  This makes two shows in a row that had absolutely amazing first episodes.  Eden catered towards my appreciation for good characters and directing, like ef-memories and Higurashi. For Basquash, it caters towards my interest in shows that put a lot of emphasis on the setting, like Eureka Seven and Last Exile.  In fact, I almost consider Basquash to be the fusion of Gurren Lagann and Eureka Seven.

Spring Pilots: Eden of the East

I honestly had to stop myself from doing a full episode review for this.  I never said this was a guaranteed show to blog, and I didn’t feel like breaking my own personal rules… but that won’t stop me from giving the first episode endless praise.

Eden of the East really was on a level of its own from everything else this season.  Even the next best show I saw this season, Phantom, really couldn’t compare.  The first episode did almost everything right.  It was engaging, interesting, and most critically, it made me want more… a whole lot more.

Spring Pilots: Tears to Tiara

As promised: part 2 of the Spring RPG Adaptations: Tears to Tiara. This time I have more to go on for this series this I did for Valkyria.  Tears to Tiara is an RPG/Eroge from the visual novel company, Leaf.  It is the successor to their previous RPG/Eroge, Utawarerumono.  Thankfully, the original game company isn’t the only thing the two anime have in common.

Spring Pilots: Valkyria Chronicles

Next up are the two big RPG adaptations of the season: Tears to Tiara (which I’ll do next), and this one, Valkyria Chronicles. It definitely doesn’t fit the mold of your standard RPG; however, this element might end up hurting the show more then helping… at least early on.  

Spring Pilots: Pandora Hearts

Pandora Hearts has been something I’ve been looking forward to watching since I found the manga to be very fascinating and it brings a very dark twist to the idea of Alice in Wonderland. The pictures currently provided are few because I was watching it streamed so I just took whatever had the best quality out of the bunch I attempted to take a screenshot of.
So anyway, I have high hopes that this series will be successful although the first episode didn’t reveal too much. And please forgive any mistakes I might make as I type this in lieu of sleeping and working on homework.

Spring Pilots: Hanasakeru Seishounen

Hanasakeru Seishounen was my reason for coming to this blog.  When Tekky invited me, he mentioned that there was a particularly ridiculous-looking shoujo series coming out in the spring, and that he wanted someone to blog it.  “Me,” I said instantly.  “I’ll take it.”  From looking at the art, I knew it was going to be overblown, dramatic, and hopelessly sparkly.  What I didn’t know until now (but really should have guessed) was that it was also mysterious and somewhat homoerotic!  In short, this series plugs right into all the pleasure receptors of my brain.

Here have an ugly screenshot collage I made with MSPaint

Here’s the summary.  Kugami Kajika (let’s not talk about her full name) is the daughter of a powerful American businessman, who has just called her back from Japan (where she was living for some reason for a few months) to pick a husband out of three(?!) guys he deems worthy.  If Kajika falls in love with any of them, that man (and her father) will win the “game.”  Somehow this scheme has something to do with the murder of Kajika’s mother a number of years ago; at this point, the only thing we know for sure is that Kajika is beautiful, brave, and probably also a genius.  The author would really like to have us like Kajika.  A lot.  Do you like Kajika yet?  Might as well hop on the train, because it is clear that every single person in this series is going to fall in love with Kajika.  Some people might hate her and try to kill her, but those will probably be either 1) unreformably evil, or 2) eventually converted to moist-eyed Kajikaism.  So…if you think you might not like Kajika…well, you’re weird.  Sorry.

Spring Pilots: Shangri-La

Wow, I never thought I’d say this about about anything.  The first episode of Shangri-la was great, average, and bad ALL AT ONCE.  This assesment actually makes sense if you split the show into three categories: action, setting/characters, and story.