Steven declared that he couldn’t stop laughing after the second episode of Asobi ni Iku Yo (spoilers), so I checked it out. There’s more fan service than I like, and it’s a bit too off-color to generally recommend, but otherwise it’s been fun. It looks like the story is will be pleasantly convoluted, with nearly every character representing various competing secret organizations, and I’m certainly not going to object if one of the central characters is a sweet, playful and competent catgirl.

If the series gets stupid or devolves into mere fanservice, I’ll drop it. However, this is one of the very few recent shows that have caught my interest, and I have hopes that the crew can maintain a high level of complicated absurdity through the remaining eleven episodes.

How much sense Asobi ni Iku Yo ultimately makes might depend on the translators. Compare these two versions of a moment in the second episode. Eris, the adolescent fantasy alien catgirl, is speaking to her human captor, who has the scent of dog on him.

Ayako & SubDESU:

Ayako & SubDESU

Team Zebraman:

Team Zebraman

Update: Here’s the clip in question. Would someone who understands Japanese please explain what exactly Eris says?

The previews for the third episode suggest that the Ayako/SubDESU version is more accurate. Note the entity in the lower right corner of this screen capture:

A thought: so far, no weapon has presented any real threat to Eris. What would happen if an enemy were to roll a ball of yarn in front of her at a critical moment?

*****

Steven also enjoyed Battle Programmer SHIRASE. Unfortunately, scarywater.net is defunct, and many older torrents are no longer available. Grr.

*****

Want a catgirl of your own? Visit the catgirl generator:

This brave catgirl has slitted, red eyes. She has neck-length, luxurious, curly, brown hair worn in an impractacal style. Her skin is pale, and she has brown fur with orange patches on her ears and tail. She has a voluptuous build. Her ears are alert. Her fashion preferences are best described as “as little as possible.” When she talks, she tends to use a lot of big words – and know exactly what they mean. (sic)

You can find many more generators here and here. (Does the world really need a “Bishotron“?)

See it.

The script to Shoka won the grand prize in the Animax competition in 2008. I’m not sure why. While the gimmick of using calligraphy and other arts as the basis of magical combat lends itself well to animation, the story and the characters are of scant interest. Still, the piece is worth seeing for the art, particularly if you’re sick of moeblobs with insectoid faces. Screen captures are below the fold.

I also recently watched Haiyoru! Nyaru Ani and Ranma – Akumu Shunminko. The former — a series of short moe-meets-Lovecraft animations — might sound like a brilliantly insane idea, but I don’t recommend it unless you think stabbing a little girl¹ in the hand with a fork is funny. The latter is part of a celebration of Rumiko Takahashi’s work. It prominently features Happosai, and demonstrates why he has done so well in the current poll. I can’t recommend it either, even if it is the first new Ranma episode in years.

Update: Here’s the right way to make Cthulhu cute.

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1. She’s actually Nyarlathotep, but she still looks and acts like a silly little girl. [↩]

I’ve downloaded a number of first episodes from the fall and winter seasons, but I have yet to make it more than half-way through any of them. Some might actually be worth watching, e.g., Durarara, but I’m just not in the mood right now. I sent off an order for some older titles yesterday — the Ghost in the Shell: Stand-Alone Complex, Moonphase and Black Heaven boxed sets (and a set of El Hazard playing cards) — but those are likely to remain in their shrink wrap for a while. I have things other than anime on my mind, and if I do pop a DVD into the drive, it more likely will be an old favorite like Shingu than anything new.

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A couple of silly links:

Another example of silhouette animation, this one recounting the avian terror in Clerkenwell.

If you play Dungeons and Dragons, stay out of prison in Wisconsin.

Naga, left, and the other fashion designer from the third episode.

A friend found that he had two copies of Slayers Excellent, so he gave me one (thank you, Richard). It’s set earlier than the TV series, before Lina meets Gourry, Zelgadis et al. Instead of them, we have Naga the Serpent (approximately .8 Rushunas). How much you enjoy Slayers Excellent depends on how much of Naga you can stand. She’s every bit as stupid as Gourry, but unlike the dense but admirable swordsman, she’s a narcissist with no compensating virtues. It’s a good question whether she’s more dangerous as an enemy or an ally. She sorely tries the patience of Lina and the audience, and she might be a candidate for the next poll.

Naga aside, the three episodes of Slayers Excellent are mostly decent farces¹ in which Lina faces a vampire, escorts a spoiled rich girl on a journey, and gets caught in a fashion feud that escalates faster than a flame war. The last episode is a showcase for Aya Hisakawa as the deranged defender of tradition.

I ran a few tests, and I can report that, contrary to rumor, Naga’s laugh will not peel paint. Possibly, if you play it repeatedly at a high volume on a good sound system, it might soften the surface layer of a painted object, but if you have furniture to refinish, a chemical stripper will work far more efficiently and present fewer health hazards.

1. The ending of the second episode is a bit indecent. [↩]

Over at Steven’s place, people are listing their five favorite animes and speculating on what their choices say about them. Here’s mine:

1. Haibane Renmei
2. Serial Experiments Lain
3. Denno Coil
4. Cardcaptor Sakura
5. Shingu

Let’s see: I like science-fiction and fantasy, complicated stories that ultimately do make sense, well-developed and engaging characters, and background music that’s interesting in its own right. (Update: And also stuff that’s out of print or unlicensed. Of these five series, only the last is currently available in the USA.)

*****

Another list I recently came across: The Top 25 Anime Characters of All Time. Yeah, right.

*****

I’ve watched the first two episodes of Kuuchuu Buranko, or Trapeze. It’s worth seeing for the visual novelties, but the stories themselves aren’t as interesting as the art.

I may also continue watching Aoi Bungaku, of which I’ve seen the first episode, part one of “No Longer Human.” Cheery stuff, this. I am curious to see how well the crew handles “Hell Screen.”

Jonathan gave Kobato a tentative thumbs-up, and it is CLAMP, so I’ll take a look. Otherwise, the rest of the current season doesn’t interest me.

A girl and her dog

Recently I spotted something called Choujikuu Romanesque Samy: Missing 99 OVA on AnimeSuki. It was written and directed by one Seiji Okuda, who has worked in various capacities on anime ranging from Ponyo to Dream Hunter Rem, so I thought I’d check it out. Well, sometimes there is a good reason why an old show remains obscure.

Samy, after transformation and armored. Note characteristic expression.

It’s the same kind of story as Leda — The Fantastic Adventure of Yohko: an apparently ordinary girl is transported to a fantasy world, where she allegedly has great powers. Unlike Yohko, however, Samy, as herself, never learns how to use her powers and just stands around uselessly as others fight to protect her. Her little non-magical dog is a more effective combatant than she is. The conceptual framework is a melange of Buddhist mythology, the Old Testament and Big Bang physics. It perhaps make a little more sense than RahXephon ultimately does, but that’s not saying much. With a more competent protagonist, Samy might have been watchable, but as it is, it’s a waste of time. I can’t even recommend it for fanservice.

Some guys apparently like their girls wimpy.

More views like this, and a few more inches in the right place, would have improved the show.

Highlights from the posts I don’t have time to write:

• Taishou Yakyuu Musume is the first new show this year to sustain my interest beyond the second episode. In the first eight episodes of the story, the writers have kept the focus primarily on high school girls learning to play baseball in 1925 Japan, and they have not let the themes of feminism and westernization versus traditionalism overburden the story. There’s also been very little teen angst.¹ If the last four episodes are on the same level as the first six (the seventh and eight episodes are essentially filler), the series might be worth recommending.

Taking the maxim that “the pitcher and catcher should be as close as husband and wife” too literally.

• Ponyo is in its fifth week in Wichita, the longest any Miyazaki film has ever played here, and it’s at a theatre within reasonable bicycle distance. I watched it last weekend. The dub is tolerable, though “bug off” is not an adequate substitute for “baka.” It made a little more sense than the fansub I watched last year — I suspect that there was some discreet re-writing in the dub script — but the logic of the story still is, um, hard to follow. I’d rank Ponyo as second-tier Miyazaki, not a classic like Spirited Away or Totoro, but far better than Howl’s Moving Castle (skip the movie and read the book instead). It is well worth seeing on a large screen if you have the opportunity, particularly if you have kids.

• For the convenience of any balletomanes visiting here, this is the only section of choreographic interest in Hakucho no Mizumi, the 1981 animated version of Swan Lake.

Sorry — if you want 32 fouettés, you’re out of luck. Swan Lake does have one of the better stories in ballet, but this adaptation trivializes it. Skip it, and find a video of a good dance production instead. Or, better yet, attend a live performance when you have the opportunity.

1. Some of the girls waste time being moody and depressed in early episodes; part of the story is how they find the mental toughness to keep playing despite errors and losses. However, there hasn’t been any romangst — yet. (In the eighth episode, it turns out that one of the girls has an unlikely crush on the central character. If this gets played up in the remaining episodes, it will be seriously annoying.) [↩]

The 1985 OVA Leda — The Fantastic Adventure of Yohko, which Steven recently discovered, looked like fun, so I downloaded it.¹ The story is straightforward anime fantasy: a high school girl is mysteriously transported to an strange world, where she transforms into a warrior in a battle bikini. Screen captures are below the fold.

It’s silly, but it’s not cheesy. The art is detailed, and the animation looks smooth to my non-expert eyes. Although there are characters named “Lingam” (spelled “Ringhum” in the subtitles) and “Yoni” and the girls don’t wear a lot of clothes, there is actually very little that’s off-color. It’s probably tolerable for all but the youngest audiences. If you have any interest in old-school anime, it’s worth checking out.

Update: Here are two sets of six consecutive frames. Each of these whizzes by in a fifth of a second.

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1. According to ANN, it was once licensed by The Right Stuf International, but I found no sign of it on the RightStuf website. [↩]

Here are some curious items from the most recent batch of search terms:

heresy is not kawaii
gurren lagann knitting
cowboy bebop knitting
knitting anime themes
ponyo on a stick
sailor moon cardboard cutout
a religion based off of sailor moon
canzoni kawaii
languid gay charles solomon
gender critics are idiots
anime girl wolf boy frog
haruhi peanuts
kawaii the murderer pics
safe for work babes
oink supervisor

There were a few that make me glad that I am unlikely ever to meet the searchers:

anime manly girls
armpit hair pictures
kawaii tentacle monster

*****

Anime cosplayers are normal, sane people — at least compared to these.

Via Steven, who recently discovered Pokémon. (Update: note the third-place item in this list.)

Ubu, meanwhile, has discovered RahXephon. In a comment at Ubu’s place, Avatar confirms what I had suspected:

RahXephon was a show where we constructed a couple of really elaborate theories that explained everything, wrote off to Japan with a “so which one is it, we need to know for the translation”, and got back “huh? We did all those things because they looked cool.”

*****

I recently watched the first two episodes of El Hazard: The Magnificent World. Good grief. Here’s our hero:

I really wonder sometimes: do Japanese boys want to be girls? If you think I’m exaggering, count the thumbnails on this graphic:

The first El Hazard OVA was written by Ryoe Tsukimura. He also wrote the scripts for the first Tenchi Muyo! movie and the many UFO Princess Valkyries. They have their moments, but they’re all essentially anime junk food. Most of the rest of Tsukimura’s output looks similarly undistinguished. However, he does have one classic to his credit, Noir, which was his idea and his script. In this, he reminds me of Kou Ohtani, a competent, unmemorable soundtrack composer who on one occasion exhibited afflatus.

*****

Since I closed nominations for the current poll, commenters have mentioned Ghost in the Shell, Tenchi Muyo GXP, Kimagure Orange Road, Spice and Wolf and Wolf’s Rain. The first has been mentioned twice (the second time in an email), so I’ll probably add it to the second round candidates. Would anyone care to second any of the other series?

So you know fifth position. Very good. However, if your dancers are to do convincing pirouettes, they need to spot.

About Piggyback Rideback: if there is more ballet, I might follow it. However, if it’s just politics and mecha, forget it.

The tenth episode of Macademi Wasshoi is more of the same, with the students and faculty of the magical academy running amok while rescuing Takuto and the girls from a trio of formidable bandits. Then, about twenty-minutes into the episode, it suddenly gets very serious, and Anyone Can Die. The eleventh episode continues in the same grim vein, and there’s another death (or two, depending on how you count). It soon turns out that they’re Not Quite Dead, but now the story veers off in another unfunny direction, borrowing a motif from the final episode of Petite Princess Yucie and the forty-sixth episode of Cardcaptor Sakura. Hitherto, Macademi Wasshoi was a farce with occasional thoughtful moments. Now it’s a drama, with Sakuma and the girls as annoying comic relief.

The episode ends happily with a restoration of the status quo, but the fun has leaked out. The final episode, in which the girls try to get a Christmas present for Takuto, might have been enjoyable earlier in the series, but following the eleventh episode, it seems off-key.

So, do I recommend Macademi Wasshoi? Yes, with reservations. It’s funny and inventive overall, but it’s also frequently off-color with abundant fanservice. If it sounds like something you would like, I recommend watching the tenth and eleventh episodes last.

Update: Steven liked the eleventh episode a lot. There is a lot going on there and a lot more that’s hinted at, as Steven points out, but the shifts in tone are too jarring for me.

Those of you who are waiting impatiently for the next episodes of Macademi Wasshoi, cheer up. The translation is proceeding quite briskly in comparison to that of Master of Epic. The seventh episode of the latter has finally been fansubbed, nine months after the sixth.

Was it worth the wait? Not really. The first half showcases Tomoko Kaneda as an incompetent, thoughtless RPG character. Her performance almost redeems the lackluster writing — imagine Chiyo-chan’s hyperactive idiot twin sister in a dungeon crawl. The second half continues the Waragecha Five’s battles with the producer’s giant robots. It’s not that bad, but it’s not all that good, either. The previews for the eighth episode promise the conclusion to the robot story. That should be available around September, 2009. In the ninth episode, due out in late 2010 or early 2011, we perhaps can look forward to the return of the Waragecha Five to proper fantasy.

These past ten days or so I’ve spent most of my spare time digitizing old vinyl.¹ It’s been productive: I’ve got over ten CDs’ worth of newly-convenient music to listen to. I have a few more LPs I want to get into the computer before I move on to the next project. Watching videos is not high-priority right now.

Nevertheless, I have watched some anime — not a lot, but some. Here are a few very brief notes.

Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea — discussed below.

Macademi Wasshoi #5 — Just plain icky ….

… and #6 — More watchable than #5, but the show is still not back on track. I hope we don’t have another Kamichu! here, a wildly erratic series that starts strongly but goes nowhere.

Ghost Hound through #12 — My lunchtime project. With Ryutaro Nakamura and Chiaki J. Konaka involved, it ought to be good, but the plodding pace is frustrating. The eventual payoff had better be outstanding. My impression of the series the first time I tried watching it was that it was a taut twelve-episode show inflated to a flaccid twenty-two, and I still think so.

Natsume Yuujinchou through #4 — A show from the summer that got relatively little attention in the otakusphere while it was airing. Another example of Shinto 101, it reminds me strongly of Mokke, both in its subject matter and in its tone. It occasionally gets dangerously sentimental, but it probably is one of the better series of the year.

Astro Fighter Sunred #1 — A very silly gag series, featuring short, absurd skits and very minimal animation. You probably need to be drinking with friends to properly enjoy the show.

I may write more about these later. Or maybe not.

1. Once you get a CD player, getting up every twenty minutes to turn an LP over seems unreasonably laborious. Even though I have one of the larger vinyl collections that I know of, I don’t often listen to records anymore. [↩]