My collection of short anime reviews

Our overimaginative main protagonist.

My first review after the move to this wordpress blog is for Chobits, another Clamp’s anime. Well, it takes me 2 full days to copy all the posts in my old Windows Live Spaces blog to the new home. All posts tagged anime review – reposted are the ones that comes from the old site, while those that are tagged anime review only are originals written for this site. Now let’s move on with the review, which will be judged with a higher standard than normal because this title comes from romance genre.

Story:-
Our main protagonist moved from the countryside to the city so that he can study for his university entrance exam. One night, he found a humanoid persocon (everyone in the anime seems to have one) being thrown away at the trash bin. He then brought the persocon home and he has to teach his new persocon a lot of things (except unfortunately, the things that matters).

One thing I noticed about this anime is that it copied what D.Gray-man has done and tried its best not to show any plots for the first half of the series. You will instead have to contend with episodes like the one where the whole cast went to the beach for summer vacation and others like that. At best, the first half of the anime can be said to aid character developments, but for 12 episodes? It is at the second half of this series that a plot emerges, and it wasn’t exactly a masterpiece in my opinion. Somehow, I think Angelic Layer is doing better when it comes to the quality of the storyline. The story is very predictable, and the same can also be said about the ending that can be seen from miles away.

Meanwhile, for all its worth, the story did flow smoothly, aided by excellent presentation. All the subplots loose ends are tied up well too. Character developments are done well but it only become apparent during the second half of the anime, building on what have happened on the first half. Sumomo is definitely my favorite character here, aided by a change of role that also happens in the second half of the anime. Do you notice by now that all events that matters only happens during the second half? This is why Chobits is inferior compared to the more straightforward Angelic Layer.

This anime can lose 6 to 8 episodes and you probably won’t notice.

Sumomo, the best character in this anime.

Character Design:-
Done by CLAMP, of course it is going to be good. Definitely a positive point of this anime, despite the lack of black hairs in this modern Japan.

Voice Acting:-
Unlike the character design, the voice acting in this anime is just average at best. No one stands out from the rest either.

Music:-
For this section, this anime has good OP and 2^nd ED themes. The OST and the other 2 ED themes, not so much.

Animation/Direction:-
The animation in this anime is good, even in fast-paced scenes. I have no comments about choreography because the action scenes here are basically non-existent. The director could have done something about the black hole in the first half of this anime, but I give him/her credit for the story presentation.

Conclusion:-
6 out of 10. Well, not exactly that good isn’t it? Now let me get working more on the blog before I get another review in.

Never heard about this Red Hot Linux distro.

The best character in this series, the ten-year old Mochida Hinako and the main male protagonist.

The final review in this wave of supposedly 2007 anime reviews (I really need to check the date for all anime that I will review next time) is the promised Myself, Yourself. Similar to kimikiss pure rouge but inferior, this anime will be judged with the higher standard all romance anime title is subjected to in this blog. This anime will not win the Anime of The Year 2007 title for sure. Getting this anime out of the way is my main priority here so that I can look at the future within more positive outlook.

The main male protagonist realized that the best character in this series is infinitely better than the moody and emo main female protagonist, thus he jumped on her to do his evil deed.

Story:-
Five childhood friends were reunited after 5 years when one of them returned from another city. Each of them has to deal with their own separate romantic stories, which will eventually merge themselves into the whole main story.

This recycled synopsis of mine lifted straight from the kimikiss pure rouge review is indicative of how similar their story can be, and also how two similar stories can has the difference that can be likened to between heavens and earth also exist.

Now let me answer the question why I dodged reviewing this anime for months. The reason for that is this anime has 5 things going against it; first being how crap the story is, second being how predictable the story is in addition of being crap, third being how the story being laden with clichés in addition of being crap and predictable, fourth being how corny the storyline is in addition of being crap, predictable and cliché-laden and the fifth one will be how this anime has one of the most annoying characters (that emo wrist-slitting main female protagonist) I have ever seen since la corda d’oro primo passo.

The third and fifth reasons are the initial main causes why I paused watching this anime right after one episode, and the others surfaced during watching the rest during the past 2 days. The first four reasons explain how nauseating this anime’s story is, a far cry compared to what I have seen in kimikiss pure rouge. But still, this anime is better than the substance-less Hayate no Gotoku anytime.

Character developments are unevenly done. Some characters received more of it than others (example: main male protagonist), and there are a few who are left behind with their characters prematurely aborted (example: the megane girl with big breasts). Blame it on the large numbers of cast in a series with low episode count. Contrary to what you may think, the annoying main female protagonist is decent despite being… well, annoying. The best character in this series is the love-struck elementary school kid which actually is a bad thing for this series. Consider this, if this anime’s filler episodes (there are a couple of them here – which she has a prominent role in) is vastly better than the main story, how does that reflect on the quality on this anime as a whole?

The ending is also one of the lamest I have seen in quite some time (more often than not, a time-jump plot device will ruin everything). It made worse when coupled with the second reason outlined above. Still, this anime has an ending that you can identify. Can you say that about Hayate no Gotoku?

The moment after the main protagonist satisfied his lust, pondering how to hide his crime.

Character Design:-
Actually a positive point of this anime, the character design in this anime was done very well. The two main characters actually have black hair, which can only be good, exemplary even. Hoping more anime will follow the examples Myself, Yourself has set.

Voice Acting:-
The voice acting in this anime is good, but no outstanding character(s) can be found here.

Music:-
The OP theme is good, but not the OST or the ED theme.

She doesn’t seem to be fazed by that horrendous incident, taking everything in her stride.

Animation/Direction:-
The animation in this 2007 anime is typical of others that have been reviewed before, and better than the previous anime reviewed which is H2O Footprints In The Sand. It is good enough in fast scenes, but no comment about choreography in this type of anime that did not need it. The directing is good, at least in technical aspects like camera and scene control but not the aspects of the storyline.

Note to self: If a release is labeled BakaWolf or m.3.3.w., I might as well get the regular non-upscaled version and do the upscaling myself. Still, this is slightly better than H2O Footprints In The Sand though.

A cat is waiting for…

Conclusion:-
4 out of 10. One of the worst anime reviewed here yet, down there with Hani Hani: Operation Sanctuary (but still lightly better than Hayate no Gotoku). I’m glad that I’m able to get this out of the way. I do not know what to watch next and when, so just wait breathlessly for the next one. From all the anime I watched in this wave of 2007 anime reviews, Kaiji is definitely the best and Hayate no Gotoku really disappoints me. Hayate no Gotoku is one year wasted in high hopes of watching a good shounen anime.

…his dinner to be served.