I am so glad that this series is back, if only for the banter between Watanuki and the different members of the cast. And to make things even better, this arc promises to be among the best, if not the best arc of xxxHolic yet. It’s also the longest one yet, as the original one never went beyond two episodes per arc.

Also, here’s an interesting link, with some interesting news, for those who haven’t seen it yet: http://www.xxxholicanime.net/2008/04/xxxholic-kei-13-episodes-long.php - It’s a bit disappointing to see that this series just has thirteen episodes to work with, but at least in this was it’ll be short and sweet, and there’ll be no way for it to get boring, as there seems to be enough inspiration to fill these 13 episodes.

On a side-note, I never understood why people hated the long limbs of this series. It’s not like anime-faces are the most realistically drawn anyway, with their exaggerated eyes and all, so what’s wrong with exaggerating the limbs as well? In my opinion, it’s much better than just going with character-designs in the same style of every other series.

After the first episode, I was pretty sure that I’d end up blogging this series. The second episode of Kurenai is less impressive then the first one, but that’s only natural. If you’re going to start with a bang, you obviously need to take things easy in the second episode so that the characters can be fleshed out a bit. Especially Murasaki and Shinkuro got a lot of attention in this episode.

What immediately stands out for this series, apart from the art-style, is that these two main characters don’t act their age at all. I can imagine how Murasaki was educated early on, as she already speaks Japanese at adult-level, though at the same time she’s just like a princess who has been pampered for all her life. And yet she’s more than your typical spoiled princess, because most of her arrogance comes from her ignorance, and not her need to feel superior to all lower life-forms.

Shinkuro on the other hand, doesn’t show any signs of puberty at all (something of which I’m REALLY glad). We still don’t know much about him, but he’s seen his dead mother right in front of his eyes, he probably lost his father as well, he’s turned into a killing-machine with purple blood and strange elbows.

Another thing about this series is the use of dialogue. When the tension increases, the characters hardly let the others finish speaking before they say something. Where you’d usually hear a one-second pause between one sentence and the next, Kurenai shortens this to a quarter of a second. I’m not sure whether this series is the first one to do this, but it is the first time I’ve noticed it.

One thing I’m quite curious about is the length of this series: will it be 13 or 26 episodes, and if there are 26 episodes, then how does this series plan to fill its time? Some series are quite sneaky about it. For Persona, for example, I realized really late that it was supposed to run for two seasons, instead of just one.

Okay, this is going to be the first series that I’ll be blogging for the current spring-season. At first sight, this series looks rather underwhelming when compared to the rest of this season, but as I watched this episode, I suddenly realized that I’ve actually got lots of reasons to blog about this series.

First of all: the people who worked on it. The director of Mokke, adapting a story from the writer of Kino no Tabi. Of course it’d be interesting to check out to see such a combination. Add to that the art director of Hi no Tori and Madhouse who’ll be doing the animation. It’s pretty clear by now that the animation isn’t detailed at all, but I don’t care, as long as the series looks good. And that’s definitely the case for this series.

Then there are the themes, which lay an interesting parallel to the other series that appeared this season. During the Spring Season of 2007, a lot of series featured a veteran, travelling and taking care or protecting a relatively weak partner. In Seirei no Moribito, Balsa took care of Chaggumu, Wellber no Monogatari featured Tina that took care of Rita, in El Cazador Nadie watched over Ellis and in Claymore Claire had Raki around her, just to name some examples. The current season features a lot of spunky females that have to deal with a guy that’s on a level above them: Itazura na Kiss, S.A, Crystal Blaze, Toshokan Sensou (of which I’ll post my first impressions once Kaiba and Junjo Romantica air) and Vampire Knight.

In all of these series, the male character acts as a sort-of brake. These females do pretty stupid things at times, mostly due to their inexperience, but so far they’ve always been protected by their male companion, to hold them down so that they don’t lose complete control. Allison to Lillia, however, is different. Will is basically a wuss, and instead Lillia is the stronger one, even though she does make naive decisions, just like the other female leads of the series I just mentioned. Where does she end up with this? Well, crashed out of her plane and with Will unconscious for a part of the episode. In Allison to Lillia, there isn’t just one character that’s just “better”. Allison and Will both have their own strong points and their weak points, and so far they’ve complemented each other pretty well.

Then there are the influences by the writer of Kino no Tabi. This series is both subtle, and it makes you think. In this episode, Allison and Will stay the night at the house of a woman who lost both her sons in the war. At the time, Will was unconscious, so she just had to offer them a place to rest, even though she immediately recognized that they were involved in the war. Against two youngsters like that, she of course can’t do anything to stop them, so instead she just lets the two stay the night, while clearly voicing her own opinion about the war. As the episode progresses, her relationship with Allison and Will subtly changes.

Then there are the side-characters. I love it when a series puts time into even the insignificant ones, to make them more than just cardboard figures. I don’t think that this series has featured any character that at least didn’t have some kind of personality or story. So yes, I’ll be blogging this. It’s quite quiet at times, but I like series that are quiet, yet deal with serious topics as war and similar things. With 26 episodes, there’s plenty of potential for this series to work with. There were a few details that were wrong with these episodes (one of the woman’s son’s uniforms seemed to fit Allison a little too well), but this is just nitpicking.

Yup, like expected: the entire success of this arc will depend on whether the final episode will deliver or not. Unfortunately, I’ve also been spoiled about it, so it’ll all depend on the execution. What I’m most curious about is the chairman himself. We know Kaiji by now and his fear is nothing new by now. But what I really want to see is the tricks up on the sleeve of this old master. He says that he’s a king and he can draw whatever he wants on a second turn, but it this just a bluff?

My guess is that he very well knew that Kaiji was cheating. I mean, what other idiot would just throw away his fingers? The guy checked out all possibilities, and probably found the second winning lot when he was checking every corner inside the box. He didn’t draw it, and instead mixed it with the other lots in order to make the gamble more “fun”, and make it last longer.

I admit that the choice to blog this series was a wrong one. During the past fall-season, I ended up blogging a lot of “wrong” shows. Shugo Chara, Suteki Tantei Labyrinth and Gundam 00 were also nice series and all, but I didn’t feel like blogging them was really interesting, especially with Shugo Chara. During the past Autumn-season, I really found out that I have the most fun in blogging a series that I can sing praises over and over about. Of course, making fun of bad series is fun as well once in a while, but you don’t want to do this for every episode. This is why the final episodes of Claymore and .Hack//Roots also felt such a chore for me to blog.

It’s the same as with Kaiji, although I don’t mean to say that this series isn’t good. This isn’t a show like Jigoku Shoujo that’s different with each single episode, so that I can have something to say for each single one of them. This is a series that is intended to be marathoned for entire arcs, just to beef you up with adrenaline for some kind of major sporting event or something.