I personally had a hate/love relationship with the first season of Kaiji. Of course the concept was awesome: gambling and mind games? this series would have been awesome to watch… if only it didn’t take forever to get from A to B. The first season just consisted out of four arcs, but in the end it was just too dragged out for me to really recommend it. Now, the second season only has two arcs. And yes, it’s just as long.

Again, it sounds wonderful on paper: this series continues with Kaiji having to find a way to win seemingly simple gambles, which prove to be exceptionally devious. The first arc is actually very good: it’s got excellent build-up and knows exactly what it wants to be. There is a good balance of Kaiji to figure out a plan to win his bets, the execution is short but sweet and it overall reaches a very satisfying and adrenaline filled conclusion.

The problem with this season lies with its monstrous second arc: the pachinko arc. Oh my god, that was way too long. In total, this one takes up a whopping seventeen episodes, even though its story really isn’t that complicated. The creators could easily have done this arc in about 11 episodes. The result? is that the remaining time is spent on stalling time.

Now, delaying the inevitable on its own can be quite effective. This show however takes it way too far. It starts off nicely with a crazy premise, intriguing build-up and an atmosphere that just tightens with every episode. After a while though, the creators just start to repeat themselves to increase tension. They repeat over and over how characters are feeling, they explain over and over what’s going on, and this just goes on and on, without going even further. On top of that, they just keep inserting these pointless and inconclusive symbolism scenes that all try to be different yet all just try to say the same thing. This show tries to build up an over the top atmosphere filled with adrenaline, but it lacks the substance to keep it up. I’m willing to say that if you marathon the first season, you’ll get an adrenaline filled roller-coaster ride out of it. I can not say the same for the second season, however.

To make matters even worse, this season also features its share of character derailment, especially near its end. The old man of the first season devolves into a deranged lunatic for no discernable reason whatsoever. Kaiji himself also starts to act really weirdly and against his character near the end, and the final episodes are also way too filled with manly tears. There’s a difference between acting over the top and overacting, and this series ends up crossing that line. And this takes into account the first season, in which that line wasn’t crossed.

What also makes this less adrenaline filled as what it could have been is that the stakes at the final arc… really aren’t that severe when you compare it to what Kaiji had to go through in the first season. That season was completely crazy in what Kaiji all had to do in order to win. When you compare the gore with each other, the second season is really tame. In the first season Kaiji was pretty much scarred for life or even dead in the case of a lost bet. The second season reduces the stakes to life time imprisonment. I mean, that’s pretty bad too and all, but not for watching a hot blooded adrenaline show.

There were months in which I rated this second season quite highly, and its first fifteen episodes or so pretty much do what they need to do. Looking back though… I really can’t recommend this show in its entirety. Just watch up to the Chinchiro arc for a nice conclusion, but there’s no need to bother with the incredibly long pachinko arc. It’s just not worth it.

Suggestions:
- Kurozuka
- Touhai Densetsu Akagi
- Rainbow

Time to review another one of the top shows of the past Summer season. Kami-Sama no Memo-Chou is either my third or fourth favourite show of the serie that debuted on Summer 2011, depending on how well Blood-C’s ending turns out. This was the series to go to for intelligent mystery, well written scripts and varied cast.

Especially the script of this series is something where this series shined like no other. Thsi show, above all else, is well written. It consists out of a number of standalone arcs that are all focused on some murder mystery, and it’s the script that does wonders in fleshing all the different cases out into multi-layered stories and it tries to put as much meaning into the eventual conclusions as possible. This makes just about every conclusion worth watching, as the creators always manage to throw in some sort of satisfying conclusion.

The cast of characters is also an interesting bunch: from the outside they all look like your regulr JC Staff cliches (you know, moe school girls, bland male lead and in particular an annoying little girl), but this show actually manages to give an original spin on them. It does so by excellent acting, and also by giving each of the characters strong roles. The cast of this show is HUGE, but it’s very varied, and most of them turned out to be actually very interesting to watch. The male lead meanwhile starts off a bit bland, wanting to help people for the sake of helping people, but as the show moves on he really grows into a reliable and sympathetic manager and organizer.

Where this show falls down is that it doesn’t seem to realize that it’s only got 12 episodes. It doesn’t drag, but some arcs are very long (one takes up four episodes; that’s a third of the entire series!) and there are too many episodes that focus on the side characters. That’s nice and all, and the result was that the characters in question got some really memorable stories, but because of that there was no time left to animate the arc that focused on the central character of this series: Alice. She could have been an amazing character with a little bit of depth. And in fact, the entire series ended just prematurely: It’s built up in such a way that a potential second season has the potential to become a classic. Unfortunately, that will probably never arrive.

Oh, and there is also something that you need to take in mind when ou start watching this series: the fanservice. This remains JC Staff unfortunately, and so the creators tried to insert very out of place fanservice scenes, similar to what happened with Index II. Don’t worry though: these scenes disappear in the second half. Right when this series really starts to hit its stride, although its opening episode also is one heck of an eye catcher.

Suggestions:
- Himitsu The Revelation (Granted, Kamimemo does not hold a candle to the master of the arc-based murder mystery genre, Himitsu - though it is a fine attempt nevertheless)
- Ayatsuri Sakon
- Shinrei Tantei Yakumo

Well, it had it coming, but I’m still really glad that it actually happened: this was pretty much the best ending out of all of the unfinished series that have ended this month, and I also doubt that it will be surpassed like anymore. The big flaw of this season really is the length, and this showed in a ton of series: No.6, Kamisama Dolls, Ao no Exorcist, Kaiji (though in the opposite way)… aside from Natsume Yuujinchou (which is the only one of the bunch who actually got a second season), there are just four shows who avoided this: Usagi Drop, Croisee, Dantalian, and this one.

And I know that this show had it easy by being episodic, but still: the creators did pick a great arc to finish on, and they executed it right. With this, there is only one major problem with this series: its wasted potential. This series can become so much more with 12 extra episodes. The iffy episodes at the beginning… they don’t matter anymore. The fanservice disappeared completely in the second half, and Narumi really grew up. He started out as yet another Touma, but the use of Ayaka in this episode really matured him beyond just that role.

Ignore the length, and I’m very happy with how this series turned out. Heck, this pretty much was the best JC Staff series since Aoi Hana.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

I’m a fan of Studio Deen…. but not this year. So far, I consider them to be even worse than AIC, because at least AIC delivered Hourou Musuko and Persona 4 this year. Something really needs to happen to them, because in the past they have delivered plenty of classics.

This episode thankfully was not as abysmal as the first episode of Higurashi no Naku Koro ni Kira. At least stuff happened. Instead, this was just boring. It was pretty much like the silly episodes of Higurashi Rei, only worse. The reason why they worked well with Rei and not here is simple:
1) those episodes were simply better executed. They did what the TV-series did, only more over the top. It was varied, the characters had fun with each other and the timing and delivery was good. Instead though, you can really see how much the new director hurts here. This episode felt lackluster, the characters one sided and its scenario was just dull and predictable.
2) In Higurashi Rei, the silly episodes were wrapped around an amazingly written storyline focused on Rika. They juxtaposed well because of that: on one hand you have the characters just having fun, and other other hand there are the hard hitting storylines that made this show big. Take away the latter, and you have just random episodes that try to be funny, but because of reason 1), aren’t.

Here’s the thing: the silly episodes of the previous installments of Higurashi added to the characters. This however reduces the cast to caricatures. The preview to the next episode suffers from this as well: it on purpose focused on the caricatures of the cast.
OVA Episode Rating: 6/10

Oh, thank god! After No.6 and Kamisama Dolls suddenly took a turn for the worst, I’m really glad that this series continued its consistent run. With this, it stands above both these shows, as even though there is a ton of wasted potential here, it actually looks to close off really solidly.

This episode was solid build-up, but what struck me in particular is how the main cast grew even closer to each other. What happened to Ayaka was perfect for that. And in the meantime we got a great mystery story, looking for exactly how it happened. The cast definitely grew on me even more this episode, especially with the addition of the hopelessly broken brother of Ayaka.

Still, this case does seem awfully simple now that the creators hinted at the big boss drugging Ayaka and getting her to drop off that cliff. Still, even considering that there are things that still don’t make sense: why did she choose the school building of all places?
Rating: ** (Excellent)

There is one thing at which Steins;Gate is unrivaled at compared to anything else that aired this year: its plot. If it’s originality, creative twists and multi layers that you want, then this is a must-watch. This has a bit of a slow start, but as the series goes on its intricately woven plot about time travel shines like no other and this show is masterful at combining seemingly insignificant hooks into gripping plot twist. This definitely stood out as one of the most solid shows of the past half year.

Helping with that is a unique style of this series. The entire series is animated with dull and washed out colours, the animation is simple and only becomes really smooth when it really needs to (with great effects, by the way),and a lot of time in this series is spent on characters just talking to each other while the plot slowly progresses. It’s slow, but each episode has its purpose, even though this only may become apparent later on. The lead characters’ monologues in particular are well written, but on top of that this is a series that really did its research into time travel. It may not present the most logical way that time travel might be possible (I mean, there are still parts where you’re going to have to suspend your disbelief), but it’s very well researched.

The weakest part of this series is its cast of characters. Obviously they’re not bad, but they do have a few quirks that didn’t make them as interesting to follow as some of their counterparts. In particular, the acting of the main cast leaves things to be desired, in which they’re trying too hard to fit themselves into certain stereotypes. Daru, Kurisu and Mayuri are the biggest examples of this, which often makes them annoying to watch. The main character Okabe meanwhile just tries too hard: during the dramatic parts he tends to act too dramatic, and during the light-hearted parts he tends to act too over the top (which becomes rather repetitive after a bunch of episodes).

That’s pretty much what held this show back for me. Do not let that discourage you however, because there have been plenty of people who experienced the characters in a completely different way. Heck, at the beginning of this season I did not expect another series this year to come close to the amount of acclaim that Madoka Magica got. I personally did have these beefs with the characters, but even there there are still plenty of good parts about the cast of characters, in particular their development.

Suggestions:
- Noein
- Higurashi no Naku Koro ni
- Bokura no

And here we really see the advantage of adapting a medium that has already finished: it’s so much easier to plan in a great conclusion. This episode really impressed me by how it did exactly what it needed to close this thing off. I do have one question about the plot, though. Did I miss this somewhere by not paying attention?

When Okabe traveled back in time with his time machine, shouldn’t he have seen his version of the previous episode together with him? I mean, I was really looking forward to seeing Okabe stop not just Kurisu’s father, but also his own blunder of killing Kurisu last episode. He didn’t use any D-Mails to undo that, right?

Either way though: the rest of this episode rocked. The metal Upa thing took a while to hit home, but again I have to praise this series for putting so many huge consequences on such a tiny little thing. The finale was over the top, but it was wonderfully animated. This series has definitely found a unique style of animation, and even though it only had the budget to show this once every three or four episodes, it really made huge additions to this series. This episode was also where that came together wonderfully.

Oh and yeah: a movie just got announced. This episode closed off nicely, while still leaving a number of key questions unanswered. There are things like Suzuha’s mother, but the biggest is probably: why didn’t Kurisu start to work for Cern? In fact, that whole subplot is still pretty unexplored, because she only became like that in the Mayuri-death-timelines: where she met Okabe. Something happened there that killed Okabe and Daru, caused such an unlikely scenario to happen. I hope that the movie is going to focus on that.

Overall, the past Spring had four shows that stood head and shoulders above the others: Ano Hana, Tiger & Bunny, Hyouge Mono and this one. Overall, I think that I do like Anohana better. As for second place though, that’s really going to be a tough one: Tiger & Bunny had much better characters, while at the same time it had a less impressive plot, and the settings of both all were incredibly well constructed, while Hyouge Mono has better acting, while its plot will entirely depend on what it has planned for its final 13 episodes. All in all though, it was one heck of a ride, and definitely set a standard for the other endings this season.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

Oh heck. It may not be the Alice arc, but once again this was really good. Ayaka’s brother’s introduction gave a completely different light on her character and I have no doubt that the creators can make something nice out of it. Especially that ending: at first I thought it was some sort of flashback. Then I accidentally caught a glimpse of next week’s preview (I always really try to avoid those). Yeah. This will be an awesome finale.

Now, I do want to hi-jack this post for a bit for some general observations of this entire summer season, especially considering that this series has a pretty big part in this. I remember noting at the start of this season that this might be the best summer season so far. Now, the season of course hasn’t ended yet, so anything can still happen, but I do not think that it will end up like this. My favourite Summer Seasons so far are the ones of 2006 and 2007, and I do not think that this season overall can beat them.

And the biggest reason for that is in my opinion the trio of No.6, Kami-Sama no Memo-Chou and Kamisama Dolls. I mean, Penguin Drum and Natsume Yuujinchou are both doing fantastic. They are more than enough to make this season awesome at this point. Blood-C although it is not as great as it could have been still looks to be rock-solid, while the slice of life series of Ikoku Meiro no Croisee and Usagi Drop are also doing really well. Meanwhile there is the big surprise of Blade, and Dantalian no Shoka is also very charming. The Kamisama series and No.6 should have been the icing on the cake, and while they are really good series: they could have been pure gold if they were longer. It’s by far the biggest weakness of this season.

Compare that to 2006, which had four 2-cour series which made brilliant use of their length (Bokura ga Ita, Chevalier, Night Head Genesis and NHK ni Youkoso), some rock-solid 1-cour series who knew exactly how long they were (Flag, Kemonozume and Honey and Clover), added to some awesome light-hearted shows (Akazukin & Power Puff Z).This season unfortunately wasn’t enough to really match that and it still stands as my favourite Summer Season ever. As for 2007, it is slightly more difficult. The thing with that season is that it had five absolutely amazing and ground-breaking series (Baccano, Higurashi Kai, Shigurui, Mononoke, Sayonara Zetsubou-Sensei), but hardly anything memorable aside from that. This season has definitely beaten it in terms of quantity and it has many more series worth watching, but unfortunately only Penguin Drum really matches up to these best series, with perhaps also Natsume Yuujin-Chou San if the ending is really good. If Kamisama no Memo-Chou, Kamisama Dolls and No.6 were longer however, they actually would have stood a chance to also stand in that tier. In that case this season would have also blown Summer of 2007 out of the water.

As for third place though: I’m pretty confident that this season will take that. 2008 had some really good series with Xamdou, Ultraviolet, Blade of the Immortal, Natsu no Sora and Natsume Yuujinchou I, but that just doesn’t match up to the huge array of excellent series that are aired right now. 2009 meanwhile had a select number of classics (2009 had Tokyo Magnitude, Aoi Hana, Spice and Wolf II, GA and Umineko, but in the end this season is just richer, has more variety consistency. 2010’s only noteworthy series meanwhile were Shiki, Kuroshitsuji II and Occult Academy, with perhaps also Denyuuden added. That also just doesn’t match up.

However, I am very happy with this season. The thing is that 2006 and 2007 were near godly years for anime, in which so much stuff happened at the same time. This was the summer season that came closes to those years, and who knows. This upward trend might be continuing. At the very least, the next season is one that isn’t bothered at all by short series lengths. I’m quite hopeful for the future.
Rating: ** (Excellent)

OMG! WTF!

Right from the start I knew that this would be the point that I had been looking forward to the most: the explanation of what the heck happened during that first episode. And yeah. It pretty much was my favourite episode of Steins;Gate yet. But for the love of God, that plot twist in which Christina’s killer is revealed was awesome!

This episode really was amazing. Everything came together wonderfully. The twists that the plot took here were brilliant, and I even loved the characters. Okarin’s future self’s message was awesome in how well his past version understood what he had to do.

I really thought that Moeka, FB and CERN were the central villains: that they too were somehow involved with the third world war somehow. Instead though, they are just vital for Mayuri’s death, and they only come in action when they actually intercept that D-Mail. They probably participated in the arms race for building the time machine, but without Kurisu they actually didn’t get the upper hand.

And holy crap this thing only has 24 episodes. It’ll be over next week! Okabe is going to have to save Kurisu in one single episode. It actually is possible if the creators play their cards right. I’ve said many times before that an ending can make a huge difference on how I view a series, and out of all the series that are going to end this season, this one has the best papers for it. The most important thing: do not rush too much!

Also, who put the OP through a blender?
Rating: *** (Awesome)

Kami-Sama no Memo-Chou what the heck do you think you’re doing you only have 13 episodes.

This is what I mean by this show acting like it’s twice its length: I mean this episode standalone was very good, but in the context of this series the creators pretty much wasted one valuable episode. I mean, Nemoto’s background was very good and all, but do the creators really want to focus on such a minor character when there’s enough gold buried underneath the main cast? The writing and mystery of this series really are great, so it’s very annoying when the creators keep dodging them…

But yeah, this episode. It was a bit bizarre, suddenly deciding to go with a baseball episode of all things, but it was fun to watch. Especially Alice showed a totally different side of her when she actually went out to the field to try batting. It obviously wasn’t meant to be believable at all, but it’s a good way to flesh out the main cast. It was fun. Heck, even the fanservice was nearly completely toned down. It’s just completely the wrong time for it.

What’s more: the previous episodes promised us some awesome backstory on Alice. And yet the final arc of this series seems to focus on Ayaka. Which is nice and all, but that does leave us with a main character with gaping holes in her back-story. I was really looking forward to that story of hers, so it’s a bloody shame that we won’t get to see it.
Rating: * (Good)