Here’s one that surprisingly flew past the radar when it first aired. Furusato Japan (or Japan, My Homeland) really surprised me with what a powerful movie it turned out to be. Seriously, at first sight it’s just another one of those movies about grade schoolers, which starts out with slice of life and eventually introduce tragedy that the lead character has to cope with… and in a sense it is, and yet somehow this movie hit me more than most other movies with this premise.

I believe that the key is subtlety and realism. This is no story with the simple message of “war is bad, pity our lead character”, there is no evil bad guy running around, and neither is time wasted with a silly love triangle. There is no moe, no emo excessive crying. There is no unrealistic amount of tragedy, and the bad stuff that does happen is gripping, yet in no way exaggerated. This is a movie about the stuff that could have happened to anyone who grew up in japan in the 1950s.

This movie chronicles the lead character and the class he’s in, and it shows how they get shaped throughout the various events that happen in the movie. The development is realistic: the characters change, but only slightly and subtly. It’s a movie about forgiveness; about coming together and doing something instead of just letting time slip by.

The only part where this show isn’t realistic is when characters start singing. For some reason, every kid gets the voice of a fully trained professional singer. In real life, you’d hear them screaming at all sorts of pitches (I don’t want to know how horrible I sung during school musicals). However, in exchange the final parts of the movie are a joy to listen to. The finale in this movie is basically a long string of singing children. When you know the context that gets explained throughout the movie, it really turns into a powerful experience.

it’s really slice of life at its finest. This movie is so far away from anime cliches and stereotypes. The songs in this movie have great singers behind them. Its a really underrated gem.

As usual my December Summary is a bit earlier than usual so that I have a bit more time to work on the rest of the posts that I have planned for the next couple of days. Overall, this autumn season stands out as mostly unspectacular, with the exception of a number of amazing and groundbreaking series.

#21 (21) - Winter Sonata - (7/10) - The worst thing about this series isn’t the cheese, it’s not the angst, it’s not the dull plot, it’s not the female lead. It’s the fact that the two male leads look so damn much like each other. Seriously, they’re like copies of each other with just different hair colours. One filter, and there. That’s gone as well. The big climax of the fourth episode was completely lost on me because I had no bloody idea who was who.
#20 (11) - Konnichiwa Anne - (7,5/10) - Meh, I’m not happy about the ending, and the way the creators ended up bringing back the characters. It so does not fit the canon of Anne of Green Gables. This series really had its moments, but these final episodes were just uninspired.
#19 (19) - Kimi ni Todoke - (7,75/10) - I really can’t see the charms of this series. Sawako and Kazehaya… the relation between the two of them just isn’t interesting, especially when the creators keep throwing these shallow love rivals at them.
#18 (15) - 11Eyes - (8/10) - There was perhaps a bit too much exposition, but I liked the ending. It’s nice and exciting, and thankfully Yuka didn’t end up ruining the show, although that she did lead to a bunch of really weird plot twists.
#17 (16) - Hetalia Axis Powers - (8/10) - An average month: nothing especially funny, but nothing especially annoying either.
#16 (17) - Kaidan Restaurant - (8/10) - I think Gakkou no Kaidan should be viewed as a collection of ghost stories, which are told through the lead characters. Originally they may have been about totally different characters, but by giving them all the same lead characters creates more unity than if the creators would just have gone with telling random stories about random people.
#15 (20) - Kobato - (8/10) - I’m starting to see the charms of this series. Kobato still pretty much is an airhead, but I like her. The chemistry between her and the rest of the cast is very nicely done, and for me it’s turned into a pretty nice slice of life series.
#14 (18) - Letter Bee - (8/10) - So, I’ve stopped looking forward to the plot, especially now that fillers have arrived. My one request to this series is to not sacrifice the plot for the fillers, and instead use them to nicely flesh out the characters. Because I’m getting to like these people more and more. Especially Nichi and Steak are always fun to watch.
#13 (14) - Anymaru Tantei Kiruminzoo - (8,25/10) - Overall, this is just a very enjoyable series. It’s not there for a deep plot or characters, but the characters are a lot of fun to watch, especially thanks to their voice actors.
#12 (7) - Kuchuu Buranko - (8,25/10) - I liked the final episodes a lot. Again, this series is nothing special: you don’t want to watch it for the depth of the characters. Instead, however, it’s been great entertainment. Of 2009, I’d rank it as my third-favourite Noitamina-series (after Genji Monogatari and Tokyo Magnitude).
#11 (10) - Sasameki Koto - (8,25/10) - This really is my biggest surprise this season. The characters really managed to turn this into a genuinely fun series with great voice acting and slice of life. The creators knew exactly how to make this series both fun and touching to watch.
#10 (13) - Tentai Senshi Sunred - (8,5/10)

While the first season had its weaker episodes, the second has none of that: every episode s a hit, and hilarious to watch.

#9 (8) - Marie&Gali - (8,5/10)

Why… Why does only one episode air every two weeks? This show is just too brilliant. Its incredibly creative ways of explaining simple scientific principles still are a joy to watch, with still no signs of it getting dull.

#8 (4) - Kemono no Souja Erin - (8,5/10)

I tend to be very picky at endings, and I did not like this ending at all. However, the build-up for that ending was really good and really took its time to get the best out of it.

#7 (9) - Umineko no Naku Koro ni - (8,5/10)

The fourth arc wasn’t as good as the third one, but it really had its charms. However, at the same time I’m not going to recommend it until the second season announcement arrives. Which is probably going to take more than two years…

#6 (6) - Cross Game - (8,75/10)

This month Cross Game again got to do what it was best at: slice of life. The banter between the characters still is incredibly subtle, and Akane and the girls’ baseball arc really gave it a bit of extra charms that really worked well.

#5 (12) - Full Metal Achemist - Brotherhood - (8,75/10)

The plot is heating up again, which is really great to see. The past revelations and plot twists were really interesting to watch and brought the much-needed spark back to this series. I’m curious where this show is going to next.

#4 (3) - Darker than Black - Ryuusei no Gemini - (8,75/10)

So perhaps this show could have used one extra episode to explain everything (save from the OVA of course) but overall it was a very solid and thought-provoking ending for a great series.

#3 (5) - White Album - (8,75/10)

What a great way to close off this series! The ending really wrapped up Touya’s story very nicely, and the past few episodes really didn’t just conclude all of the different stories throughout the series, they also really developed the characters and made everything come together wonderfully. I must say, despite the pain that the first season was, the second season really surprised me.

#2 (2) - Armed Librarians - The Book of Bantorra - (9/10)

The reason I like this series so much is how it manages to weave so many different storylines into one. It takes care to give everyone a fitting background, and each arc combines the present and the past wonderfully into one heck of a storyline.

#1 (1) - Aoi Bungaku - (9,25/10)

The conclusion to Hashire, Melos! was just amazing. So much passion has gon into creating and animating the characters. The final two episodes were a really good way to close off this series. Not as good, but still very powerful storytelling and amazing visuals.

The second Tenchy Muyo Movie is a step back from the first. The action is fun, the comedy is good, but the drama is cheesy. It jumps from one thing to the other without much subtlety, and it becomes a bit hard to care about the characters when they just keep overacting to the slightest things. I would have given this movie an extra half an hour and much more subtlety to make it work properly.

This movie focuses on a completely new character, and doesn’t really contribute to any existing character other than one line of background for Tenchi’s grandfather. The new girl’s back-story is interesting, but at the same time also feels too much like a recycled plot from the second OVA!

Nevertheless, this is an enjoyable movie because of the quick pacing and existing characters. They become hard to buy during the melodrama, however during the fun and upbeat parts I really have no complaints. It’s really one of those movies that’s great to watch if you’re stuck at home on a rainy day and have no idea what to watch.

The visuals are pretty good for an anime, but a bit rushed and unrefined for Tenchi Muyo. the new girl in particular probably has the worst character-designs of any Tenchi Muyo character I’ve seen yet. The soundtrack however is the best of the Tenchi series I’ve seen so far. Outani Kou really did a great job with it.

Overall, this is a movie that didn’t impress me. It did, however, entertain me.

People who know this blog probably know that I’ve been a big fan of the World Masterpiece Theatre for a while now. Especially Les Miserables belongs among my favourites. It’s a shame, however, that what very likely is the very last installment of the franchise doesn’t really live up to its name. It’s a mixed bag, inconsistent, cheesy, and while it has incredibly good parts, it also has parts that are incredibly bad.

Konnichwa Anne was meant to be a prequel to one of the most-loved characters of the WMT-franchise: Anne of Green Gables. However, let me say this right up front: the Anne of Konnichiwa Anne IS NOT Anne of Green Gables. She’s just a girl who happens to bear a few striking similarities, but there is no way that they’re the same person. The Anne in this series is a genius and a bookworm, even though Anne of Green Gables only later became interested in studying. Anne of Green Gables didn’t like to look back at her past, but this part tends to be completely overshadowed by cheese at times in Konnichiwa Anne.

And like I said, the plot really is a mixed bag. There are just too many episodic stories which pick out a side-character and give them a cheesy backstory and development, which only end up ruining that particular character. And this show does it over and over and over. One particularly bad example is Henderson, who plays a major role in episodes 11 to 20. She just keeps on whining with her cheesy feminist morals and completely takes away the focus from all of the interesting characters.

However, this also is a show that whenever it shines, it really shines like no other. Setting aside the cheesy side-characters, there is one character who is developed brilliantly throughout the series: Bert. The creators did an amazing job of making this hopeless drunk come alive and give him just the right amount of background and depth to really make him steal the show whenever he’s on. Heck, he’s even far more interesting than Anne herself. Really, whenever Bert and his family form the central focus of this series, it forgets all of the cheese and instead it creates what it should have been creating throughout the entire series: amazingly genuine and heart-wrenching drama.

While the rest of the episodes range from annoying to decent, they still miss that level of detail and realism that graces the rest of the WMT-series. The creators were just too immature and inexperienced to make this work, and while I really congratulate them on the truly excellent way they developed Bert, they really were the wrong staff that was assigned to this project.

Meh, I’m not exactly happy. This episode really was the final nail in the coffin for our Anne: SOMEWHERE ON THAT SHIP, the real Anne must be walking around somewhere, anxiously waiting to meet the Cuthberts. This isn’t just a matter of Anne’s voice actress (who somehow kept the same voice through the entire series, and never even once tried to act like the real Anne), but the entire direction of this episode makes no sense whatsoever. Also, there was too much pointless dialogue in this episode. You could replace 90% of it with just “blah blah blah” and it wouldn’t have lost that much of its meaning.

Of course, it was an interesting idea from the creators to give Anne the time to close off her past by bringing her some letters from the Thomas family, however it just doesn’t make any sense. Right now, Anne can think back to those times with at least a happy mindset, but that goes completely against the Anne of Green Gables: she hated her past, and only talked about it when she really needed to. Right now, I can see how Anne wants to tell all her new friends about her adventures on Nova Scotia, just because the creators decided to slap this kind of a happy ending at the end.

I’m not against happy endings, but I’m really against the ones that don’t make any sense in terms of storytelling. I’m usually very lenient on anime, but endings are one thing that I’m very strict against: after all, these are the things that you’ll remember the most after finishing a series. This episode looked too much to the past. It tried to wrap things up that didn’t need to be wrapped up: I actually really liked that you can’t be sure what happens to the people you leave behind. Just leave it to your imagination what can happen to them. This episode instead should have focused on Anne’s trip to Prince Edward’s Island. In fact, it would have made a great ending, to just see Anne imagining what it would be like to live with the Cuthberts, which was pretty much glossed over in this episode. I’d love to have seen a bit of last-minute background on Spencer and Lily, for example (non-cheesy, of course).

Overall, if I would have been in charge of adapting this series, I would have done it really differently, especially after the Thomas-arc. It’s a real shame, but this really seems to be the end of the World Masterpiece Theatre for good: when even a remake of one of the most loved characters of the franchise fails, then there’s no wonder that Nippon Animation ended up deciding not to continue it. Still, I really hope that they’re not going to give up after this. After Toei, they probably are the oldest animation company still actively producing series, and I hope that they will come with new series in the next decade. Because even without the WMT, they have made their share of wonderful series.

Thankfully I still have plenty of WMT-series that I haven’t seen yet. Right now, I’d rank the ones of which I’ve watched at least 13 episodes as follows:
8. Konnichiwa Anne
7. Trapp Family Story
6. Tom Sawyer
5. Ie Naki Ko Remi (1997)
4. Anne of Green Gables
3. Perrine Monogatari
2. Porfy no Nagai Tabi
1. Les Miserables
Rating: — (Lacking)

Anime did not do well on the Dutch television. When I was in elementary school, we hardly had any of it on, which sucked. However, when I entered high school there actually was a period when the TV-stations were seriously experimenting with it. It started with Pokemon, and probably reached its height during Dragonball Z. I think that the best we got out of it was about half a year of Cardcaptor Sakura in a really bad time-slot (you know, the time at which everyone already is supposed to be at school). Eventually though, all the anime was gradually cancelled until nothing really remained apart from the really crappy stuff.

Among the shows that also made it over here were the first two seasons of Digimon. The second season sucked pretty badly, and was nothing more than a one-sided emo-fest rip-off, but I liked the first season. Its story was cliched, but the characters were pretty charming. There are two thing that always bugged me. The first is the mysterious reason why the Dutch broadcasting company refused to show the episodes that took place in foreign countries. Seriously… wtf? The second is that at times characters kept referring to strange events that happened in the past, but we never got to see them. So when I later found out that they were supposed to be movies but that those bastards never showed them, I was pissed off. Now that I finally ended up watching the first movie, I’m pissed off even more because it’s by far one of the best episodes of the series. It would have been a terrific eye-catcher to get people interested.

It took me this long to watch this movie because, hey: it’s a movie based on a kids show. I couldn’t imagine how they can’t be something other than silly side-stories that add nothing to the franchise whatsoever. This movie is different, though. It first of all shows how some of the characters were when they were just tiny kids, but it’s also a damn good movie in itself. Its story is simple yet effective, and it doesn’t try to be anything that it isn’t. There’s enough time for that in the TV-series. Plus, for the background music the creators used the bolero. Can it get any more awesome than that? If you have somehow sat through the first season of Digimon, you owe it to yourself to check out this 20-minute prequel.

For the past five years, movies that are based on TV-series have hit a bit of a slump. They’re either lazy recap movies, or take too little risks, probably in fear of angering the fanbase. I’d say screw that. Before that time we’ve had tons of those movies which really went with their own ideas and visions. There were the big ones like Patlabor and Utena, but even the small movies like this show that you don’t always have to be epic or incredibly complex to work. Still, there is hope. Let’s hope that the upcoming Evangelion, Eden of the East and Haruhi movies will be able to break through this trend for the next decade.

There are a few things you must know about Kuchuu Buranko. It’s being directed by the director of Mononoke and Bake Neko, which were deep horror-mindscrews with deep stories and characters. Kuchuu Buranko, while you might think otherwise at first, is completely different.

It’s a series about psychology: a weird doctor and discusses 11 of his patients throughout its run. Instead of trying to surpass Mononoke in terms of depth, the creators decided to focus on something completely different: entertainment. The patients in this series really aren’t that complex: most suffer from some sort of Obsessive Compulsive disorder, and each conclusion often just requires them to realize one small thing. However, seeing this show explore their issues and struggles is where this series’ strength lies.

The characters in this serise don’t shine through their depth, but their simplicity. While they’re all exaggerated, they’re also down to earth. Just random people from all sorts of walks of life, and their problems are very easy to relate to. Especially in the second half of the series, where the creators take more and more chances, this results into a number of hilarious and charming situations.

While the depth in this series doesn’t come from the individual stories, it’s more layered when you look at the big picture. This series loves to put in easter eggs or references to past (and in some cases even future episodes), but the general message that it in the end wants to convey is genuine and yet simple.

Ah, screw it. I originally started to follow the subs because I couldn’t pick up all of the details with just the raws, but I’ve gotten impatient now. Besides, this episode wasn’t really that difficult.

But boy, what an episode the creators decided to end this series with. You can see that the creators put their last bits of creativity here in the direction. I really liked it, and I’d rank this as my third favourite ending this season (after White Album and Aoi Bungaku). It’s basically a follow-up to the cellphone kid episode, where this time we see that his father also has issues.

It’s hard to describe exactly what was so good about this episode, and I think it was a combination of many things that created its charms. The way this episode completely broke away from the formula that it had previously built up, the weird tantrum scenes of this doctor inside the toilet. I also liked the characterization of that doctor for some reason. He’s very much one of those dads who is a workaholic and neglects his family, but the personality this episode gave him was a bit more than most of these stereotypes. And really, that’s the thing with Kuchuu Buranko: its characters don’t try to be unique or multi-sided, and yet they’re entertaining because they’re so down to earth.

As for the Christmas episode, well, the creators indeed stuffed the Christmas party into the final minutes of this episode. The morals at the end of this episode were a bit cheesy, but it’s also interesting how well the creators really managed to summarize this show with just three words: nobody is perfect. That really is Kuchuu Buranko in a nutshell. Whether you’re a student, journalist, writer, doctor or famous baseball player, everyone has something that he doesn’t like. And sure, in Kuchuu Buranko they were very exaggerated, but the series also tended to be spot-on at times.

As for the next Noitamina-show, it’s going to be another Nodame Cantabile. Because I’m searching for eight shows that are going to be interesting to blog, there’s a really good chance that I’m going to end up covering it, however my big worry for it is Chiaki Kon. With a show like this one, will she really be able to match the brilliance of Kenichi Kasai’s first season, or will it just be another quirky romantic comedy that, while nice to watch, isn’t anything special?
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Well, so next week there’s unfortunately going to be a hiatus, but as if to make up for it the creators tried extra hard this episode. The direction was really among the best we’ve seen from this show in a long while, which made for a really entertaining episode.

I like how the creators decided to tell Yoki’s story through a quick flashback. It allowed them to rush through a story that wasn’t really that good or important, and yet it finally explained where this guy came from. Very clever. This also brings up hope that the creators are saving the Ishbal background for later. In any case, that flashback scene was utterly hilarious. In fact, nearly all the facial expressions of Ed were brilliant, and Al also had his moments of greatness.

And I admit. Twenty episodes ago I rather disliked Winry and her uselessness, but at least it built up her character for this episode very nicely, and this episode used it very nicely in her development. And sure, at the end she just got kidnapped again, but something tells me that she’s not going to be a damsel in distress in the next episode. I mean, Scar kills a lot, but Winry’s parents were the only ones he killed without a reason. Let’s see him make up for that in that next episode.

Then, the Chimera. It shows that Father has been working on them for quite a while. which begs the question: what about Shou Tucker? Why was he special for making a chimera that understood words? Why did he become a state alchemist for it even though Father could achieve much more? Or was this simply used as a cover? Something like “making chimeras is very hard, so don’t bother with it”.
Rating: *** (Awesome)

Yeah, at this point it’s pretty clear that Cross Game’s final quarter is going to focus at the baseball again. Now that the third quarter has ended, I really label it as the best quarter of Cross Game so far, but my fear also is that it will remain this way: I don’t see this show surpass itself anymore at this rate.

Nevertheless, it’s a good thing to see that the creators don’t want to abandon the girls’ baseball storyline that easily. In fact, it’s going to make the upcoming matches a lot more interesting, to actually see Aoba play. What I really like about her is that she really is a balanced pitcher: she’s talented, she works hard and she knows what she’s talking about, and yet her powers aren’t exaggerated or just too incredible, like with Kou. It was the same with Tatsuya in Touch, in a way.

But, that’s really for later. This episode really was as fun and charming as ever. I loved how the new club members mistook Aoba as the manager. It’s nice to see her gradually recover from her injury throughout this episode. Akane took a part-time job at the Clover-Bar, Kou bought a really ugly shirt for Aoba which she just accepted and Kou had his own moment of embarrassment when he ended up posing for Akane’s sketch. This really was an episode for tons of characters to be able to show off their quirks and charms. It was kindof adorable.
Rating: ** (Excellent)