I finally managed to catch up with the fansubs. Now all that’s left is hope that they come out soon. Overall, the series was at its best at episodes 8-14. At that time, Gamigami played a huge role, though now he’s a bit too pityful. He doesn’t really work if he’s trying to be serious, although episode seventeen remained awesome. Though that did make me hope for the love-potion to wear off soon.

This episode, Hyuu tries to tempt Pietoro by promising to return his dragon powers, if he promises to stay with her forever. I feel that she tries a bit too much and too long. Though I don’t think that she has any better methods of convincing Pietoro, so we might see some change in this soon. The great element in this episode came from Ston and Sanda.

The two of them are just so incredibly indecisive. They were looking like crazy during the previous episode, but at the beginning of this one, Ston had already given up. Only to realize that the wind-kind will punish him if he doesn’t look after her. Later in the episode, they attempt to actually kidnap Pietoro, because he is the one who makes Hyuu not want to go back.

Overall, Gamigami was funny, though his brilliance lies in his countless inventions. He hasn’t been inventing much lately, unfortunately. Narcia was still extremely cute, though. The entire episode was focused on one decision Pietoro had to make. He chose the most ambitious option, though it’s indeed clear that Hyuu won’t continue as queen much longer. The last five episodes will probably focus on getting rid of the wind-kind.

Memorable moment: Ston and Sanda trying to kidnap Pietoro. And failing.

Nitaboh is a historical movie. It plays in Japan, from 1865 till about 1875. Japan is gradually getting more and more american influences. The movie follows the rise of Nitaboh (hence the movie’s name). Nitaboh became blind when he was eight years old, due to an epidemic. Ever since, he’s been enjoying things that make sounds. When he, three years later, gets into contact with a shamisen (a three-stringed japanese guitar. Mostly played by blind people. Think Samurai Champloo 20 and 21), he decides to be a great shamisen-player. Because of his hard work, he manages this in the end.

This movie is ninety minutes long. After watching it, I had a good feeling about it. Some great and inspirational scenes are featured. Some of the tunes are surprisingly good. Both the shamisen-tunes as the regular background tunes. Seeing Nitaboh train hard, even when suffering works really inspirational. His friends also add up to this fact. The characters are really likeable. Still, there’s one big issue with this movie: it’s slow. Very slow. This makes most of the scenes in this movies very boring. But the few good scenes become great due to this effect.

The art looked a bit messy at times, though through the major part of the movie, it looked very crisp. Especially the very few action scenes it featured came out great. Still, when people played shamisen, their movements still didn’t look right. It’s something no anime has yet to accomplish: showing expert musicians playing their instruments. They always smuggle, making everything look unnatural. Nitaboh gives a good attempt, but the movements of the musicians’ hands is too fast and too unnatural.

Overall, this movie is good, but it didn’t feel like it was worth the time it took. If you’re really bored you could check this out, but most of the anime is just a bit too slow. But that’s the case with most historical anime.

We now turn to the second batch of summer-anime. These were the shows which were the most hyped for the summer-season.

Coyote Ragtime Show

This is a science-fiction action series which just oozes with style. The first episode was more focused on the side-characters, instead of the main characters, which means that we haven’t seen too much of what this anime will really be like. We did get the chance to take a good look at the bad guys, though. It seems that they’re an army of twelve extremely dangerous cyborg-sisters with highly developed artificial intelligence. Only that was enough for me to keep following this series, though the best part of this anime is the action sequences it features. A lot of things happen at once, events succeed each other in a rapid pace and the music is awesome. It did have some boring parts, but overall, I liked this first episode.

Tsuyokiss

When I first heard about this show, I feared that it would probably become horrible, with each character as a tsundere. Still, it was better than I expected. Then again, my expectations weren’t what you’d call high. I’d describe this series as plain mediocre. It’s not nessecarily good, but not bad either. It wasn’t scared to throw all of the harem-cliche’s on one pile, the little brat, the silent girl, the annoying student council member and the big-breasted teacher. But the brat was okay, I guess. I also like the orange haired girl. Though my main problem with this series were the main characters. Both the male as the female one. Whenever the two of them were together, this series became predictable as hell, and not in a good way. Actually, I think that if Tsuyokiss would have been a yuri-anime, it would have stood a chance (the hug was about the only effective scene in this), but the male main character will probably ruin things. Still, I’m really recommending this to you if you have some sort of sleeping problem. Just watch the episode right before sleeping, and I’ll be a definite help.

Zero no Tsukaima

Now this is the real garbage of this season. What we have here is a pretty good concept, being handled by the guys who produced Shana. The result is a horrible mess. Everything that could have been messed up has been messed up. The backgrounds feature some fancy CG, but in exchange for that, they lack in so much detail. A room feels more like a cheap movie-stage now. The main characters aren’t any better, as they fit every stereotype in existance. The bishounen could have been so much funnier and half of the scenes just seem aimed to display as much fanservice as possible. The anime also shows that there hasn’t been any research put into the world, as the concepts just seem totally random and convenient. My advice is to not even touch this series with a ten-foot pole.

I’m going to handle the series which I’ll be blogging for this season a bit different from the Spring Season. Back then, I started blogging every good series, but if I’ll do that again for this season, I’ll be overwhelmed. I therefore decided to pick up three series this season. The first will be Otogi Juushi Akazukin, and the last two will be the underdogs of the season. Much like Gintama of the Spring Season.

In any case, I’ve also decided to try out one series raw for each season. In this case, it’s Otogi Juushi Akazukin. And I have to say that I couldn’t have picked a better one. Everyone who wants to start with checking out raws really should start with this series. As it’s a children’s anime, a lot of simple language is used. I have to say that I was able to understand 80% of the episode globally, and I managed to figure out the meaning of 40% fo all the lines spoken.

In any case, this episode was great. It doesn’t follow the OVA anymore, so it finally has the opportunity to show its own storyline. And I have to say, Baru is awesome. The episode was mostly about introducing Akazukin to Erde’s technology and introducing the second musketeer: Princess Shirayuki (I so hope I spelled that right).

The episode starts with Souta waking up, realizing that all that happened was not a dream. Ringo then yells to him, from the corridor. As usual, she made breakfast for the two of them. Souta then gets scared about what might happen when Ringo finds out about Akazukin, so he tries to hide this. In the end, this doesn’t really work, with quite hilarious results. I’m amazed that this show also manages to include some very effective comedy. This only makes this show more enjoyable.

What follows is a very amusing conversation, in which Akazukin and Baru introduce themselves to Ringo. Akazukin also seems to have no idea that her mission’s supposed to be secret, so she blurts it out, before Baru gets the chance to remind her about her tasks. I just love how the dialogues are just so carefree. ^_^

It seems that those creatures from last episode were Nightmares, sent after Souta. We then switch to the little cat, who managed to get his hans on a tin can from a vending machine. Then Hansel pays him a visit, to check up on things, and the cat quickly hides the can behind him. Though this doesn’t really work in a room full of mirrors. ^^ It was great to see Hansel, actually checking out the vending machine, later in the episode. ^^

Akazukin, meanwhile, is amazed by the magic of the washing machine, fridge and the tv. As Ringo has yet to hear the full story, she gets more sceptical by the minute when Baru and Akazukin keep referring to “Mahou”. The TV inspires Akazukin and Baru meanwhile to go out to the town and try out some special food they saw in a commercial. This does mean that Baru has to be put on a leash. He didn’t really like that. ^^;

When Akazukin finds the food stand she was looking for, she attempts to pay with money from her own world. As Souta doesn’t have any money with him, Ringo ends up being the one who gets to pay. Ringo now gets so pissed that Akazukin has to tell her what’s going on. The two of them do have to promise to keep it a secret. Akazukin reveals that she and Baru indeed come from another world. It’s called Fandabere (”called”, not “spelled”. I still have to figure out how you spell that damned word). The world Souta lives in is called Erde. It seems that Cendrillion has escaped from her seal, and now wants to do something bad to Fandabere. I think it has something to do with conquering it. In any case, Souta is the key to reuiniting the magic from Fandabere with the technology from Erde. If she combines these, Cendrillion will probably gain huge strenght, just like the young man in the story in the first episode.

To Akazukin’s surprise, Souta doesn’t get shocked at all, he rather gets enthusiastic. What follows is an extremely hilarious scene, in which a couple of schoolgirls find Baru, and all get incredibly giddy over him. They all want to take his picture, and it doesn’t take long before he loses his temper and begins shouting. I laughed really hard when I saw how he tried to get himself out of that situation. ^_^

What follows is one of Hansel’s henchmen. This time, he comes in the form of a bat. He soon gets joined by another of his companions. Akazukin gets really annoyed when Shirayuki appears. She seems to have used the excuse that Erde was supposed to be a great shopping-opportunity to tranfer worlds. Akazukin and Shirayuki when work together to beat the two bats. (I also loved it when Akazuking declared Ringo as their personal cook on her own).

Overall, the characters in Otogi Juushi Akazukin surely are the elements that make this anime awesome. Especially each of the antics of the characters. Especially Akazukin and Baru are amazing.

Memorable moment: “…wan”