Battle Spirits Heroes

Short Synopsis: Our lead character plays a childrens’ card game.
Every season has its array of kiddie shows, so this one is no different. I do like to check out the first episode of each of them, although this does get really repetitive after a while, especially when nearly all of them are just having a competition to see who can rip each other off the most. Battle spirits though… is nowhere near the worst of the bunch. And don’t get me wrong: it’s silly, but it’s not too silly, nor overly dramatic. It’s been a while since I’ve seen such an opening series of such a kiddie shounen that didn’t cover either a hot blooded match with an overly villainous rival or some kind of epic world threatening stake. Instead, the main character plays one match, loses and isn’t angsty about it at all, and helps to test out the holographic system that is this show’s excuse to actually make those battles interesting. The only reason he won there is because nobody told his opponent that the rules had hanged. At least the chemistry between the characters is decent, but it has one major flaw though: everyone acts the same. Seriously, just about every character in this series is snarky in various degrees.
OP: Decent for a kiddie show.
ED: Badly sung and very generic J-Rock.
Potential: 10%

Busou Shinki Moon Angel

Short Synopsis: Our lead character randomly finds a battle toy in a tree.
For me there are pretty much two big mysteries of the upcoming Autumn Season: what can HunterXHunter seriously hope to add, and is Busou Shinki Moon Angel going to be anything more than a glorified commercial? As for the first, we’ll probably have to wait a really long time before that answer is clear. As for the latter… well, this episode WAS a glorified commercial, there’s no way around it: it’s an advertisement for a doll maker, and lo and behold, we have a show where the toys all have superpowers and a random boy finds one for himself. This indeed all screams blatant, which makes the good direction even more awkward. The action is decent, the pacing is nice, the use of music is pretty nice. That’s the thing with this series: if this would have been a full fledged production it would have a near dream-team for its staff; it really was one of the more solid match-ups of the entire season. Overall though: they can definitely do better. This episode had executive meddling written all over it. Especially the script is no excuse for the main writer of Bounen no Xamdou. Will I keep watching for a few more episodes though? Yes. It’s only five minutes.
Potential: 40%

Working’!!

Short Synopsis: Our lead character works at a restaurant with a lot of cute girls in it.
Oh, we’re having a pre-airing special this season. Ironically, it’s from the series that I was looking forward to the least. To my surprise however, it was nowhere as bad as I feared. This was definitely the best episode that I’ve seen from Atsushi Ootsuki. Okay, so for the director of Motto To-Love Ru, Ladies Versus Butlers and Kanokon this isn’t really hard, but the slice of life parts of this episode were actually pretty decent. It’s the comedy however, where it completely lost me. For starters, I didn’t even laugh once in this episode, but what’s worse is that it was very repetitive, and this episode just kept repeating its jokes over and over. A lot were the same jokes that I also remember from when I checked out the first two episodes of the first season. The thing with these characters is that they all have one or two quirks, and they try to show these quirks to the viewer as often as humanly possible, even if they make no sense whatsoever in the process (one character is obsessed with small things to the point where he cries for ten full minutes because someone swatted a fly), and that got old really fast. There were some original jokes that nearly worked, but my standards for comedies are really high: if it didn’t make me laugh out lout, then I refuse to sit through cringe-worthy humour in the hopes that at some point the creators might get lucky and deliver an actual joke that works.
Potential: 10%

Dantalian no Shoka

Short Synopsis: Our lead character meets a mysterious detective girl.
Aaand the last series to debut this season… also is really good. Holy crap, I can’t believe the amount of awesome seasons this season. Dantalian no Shoka is the third of the Gosick series this year, where a guy and a genius detective girl work together. The thing is, that it’s surprisingly well executed. Gosick, Kami-Sama no Memo-Chou and Dantalian no Shoka are all based on the same premise, but their execution is completely different. The most notable parts of Dantalian are its visuals, and the main couple. With Gosick, one of the big problems was that Kujou was an idiot, while Victorique was a genius: they were no match for each other when they were just solving a case. In Dantalian no Shoka, the two leads feel equal. Sure, the girl is smarter than the guy, but the guy certainly is no idiot, and actually a very likable airplane pilot, who simply isn’t a genius. He’s not overwhelmed by the girl, and neither is the girl a complete Hikkikomori who lets others do the work of gathering clues for her. It’s much more balanced this way. Now, as for the visuals: Gainax definitely did some interesting stuff with them, in the veins of “screw conventions”. The action scenes look gorgeous and very imaginative for once, but they also weren’t afraid to hide the fact that they used life-action images. Both for backgrounds, and for slideshows. It actually fits well, it’s used well, and it gives this series a unique look.
ED: Whoa, surprisingly good. Entirely life-action film and images, but a great mysterious atmosphere that works really well.
Potential: 85%

Manyuu Hiken-Chou

Short Synopsis: Our lead character runs away from her village which cuts the breasts out of women.
Okay. Wtf did I just watch? I knew that Manyuu Hiken-Chou’s premise would be ridiculous and all, but this was just completely stupid in every single way. A world in which everything is dictated by breasts? Okay, you have to give this show credit for actually going for such a premise and all, but these are the kinds of shows where you wonder: why aren’t the creators just going for straight-out porn? Why is it still pretending to be anything other than that? The parts where it tries to be serious were also completely ridiculous due to the context in which it all played. This one was worth a laugh for how ridiculous it gets, but it’s not like it’s well written or anything: the action is dull (the creators put more effort into breast movement than actual animated action scenes), the characters are all complete and uninteresting stereotypes. It’s just porn: it’s got boobs (or at least, the uncensored version will. This was also an onslaught of white stripes), watch it if you’re horny or something. Apart from that, don’t bother with it.
OP: At least it’s a bit upbeat, but it’s still very uninspired.
ED: Again a dull ballad.
Potential: 0%

R-15

Short Synopsis: Our lead character writes porn novels.
So… this actually wasn’t the worst show this season. It’s not as vapidly uninspired as Mayo Chiki or Rou Kyuu Bu. It was, however, by far the dumbest show I have seen this season so far. It’s like, the entire cast of this series comprises of morons trying to be geniuses, not to mention the huge amounts of things that are just wrong with the setting here (if you didn’t know this yet: this show is about a school full of geniuses, where the main characters’ talent is writing porn novels). The series realizes that it’s got this completely nonsensical premise, and just roles with it. The result is a ton of bad fanservice, bad acting, uninspired animation and character designs, a dull soundtrack and completely one-dimensional characters, but at least it’s trying to be creative. It’s still among the top 5 worst series this season, but I did expect this to be a lot worse, actually.
OP: Dull and generic J-Pop.
ED: Again, dull and generic J-Pop.
Potential: 15%

Nekogami Yaoyorozu

Short Synopsis: Our lead character is a youkai who lives together with people.
This turned out to be a laid-back comedy in an overcrowded genre: cute girls doing cute stuff while talking to each other a lot. Having said that though, this probably was among the better versions to come out. For once, the dialogue doesn’t just feel like random banter, but actually tries to go somewhere. There also are a lot of flashbacks, and this episode did try to establish its characters a bit versatile and especially the main character is a likable snarker. These aren’t the type of characters who you get sick of after a few minutes. They’ve got good chemistry and this might actually work with a good combination between random adventures, slice of life and comedy. The key is not having this show repeat itself.
OP: The copy paste OP again.
ED: Nothing special either.
Potential: 70%

Baka to Test to Shoukanjuu Ni

Short Synopsis: Our lead character is an idiot.
Oh god. The creators just completely gave up. I dropped the first season quite early on, but I refuse to believe that it was as bad as this first episode of this second season. This was completely dull in every single way. For some reason, the creators decided to introduce the new season with a beach episode, and a completely uninspired one at that. If this is supposed to be setting the standard, then I really don’t want to know what the rest of this season is going to be. Really, this episode somehow accomplished to not get even a chuckle out of me during the entire episode. It was just random unfunny banter, characters abusing their quirk that already was established in the first episode of the first season and the main characters trying to hit on girls while screwing up miserably. This seems to have been one of the most anticipated series of the season. Why? This was just like any other moe show, aside from perhaps some Shaft-esque visual ideas in the banter that looked suspiciously much like budget cuts.
OP: Boring song, but not the worst, and the visuals at least try out something interesting.
ED: A really bad joke.
Potential: 0%

Mayo Chiki

Short Synopsis: Our lead character gets to live together with a cute girl who pretends to be a guy.
Now this was just stupid. It’s your standard bad fanservice comedy, but with the worst parts only enlarged. The result is a first episode that makes even less sense than usual. The entire premise of this series hinges on this girl pretending to be a guy, where for some reason it’s really bad if even someone found out about her. The problem is that this disguise is utterly terrible and yet this show tries to tell us that nobody figured it out by now. Heck, even when the main character catches her in the toilet (Locks? We don’t need no stinkin’ locks!) he still doesn’t get the hint, and needs to bump into her causing her shirt to burst open (no, really) in order to finally get the hint. The rest of this episode was filled with those bizarre leaps in logic, not to mention that the main characters is overly sensitive to females, making his nose bleed whenever they touch him. Who the hell found that a good idea?
OP: Why do these generic moe shows always need to have the exact same terrible OP?
ED: Again stolen from “Generic EDs 101″
Potential: 0%

No.6

Short Synopsis: Our lead character runs into a fugitive.
If there was one genre that I’d have to label as my favourite, it’d be the adventure/mystery genre. By far the most of my favourite series hover around those series, so because of that I was quite looking forward to this series. As it turns out, Number Six is an adventure series that’s really well acted. Against my expectations it takes its time to show the two main characters get to know each other, and as a result they’re both miles away from stereotypes, even though at first sight they may seem a bit cliched. With that, we come to a bit of a problem though: the pacing. This is a show with just 11 episodes; 12 if it gets lucky. At this point it’s impossible to say whether it knows what it’s doing due to this being a manga adaptation. However, if it can use its slow pacing, yet mysterious setting (that also was well portrayed from the eyes of a teenager by the way, and this episode only skimmed the surface) to actually build an 11 episode story, this can really turn into something special. It’s got the potential, a lot of attention has gone into both the characters and the setting, the soundtrack kicks ass: it has the ingredients. But yeah: manga-adaptation.
OP: Another good song that fits the show quite well.
ED: A simple ballad. Nothing special, but nothing bad.
Potential: 80%

Mawaru Penguin Drum

Short Synopsis: Our lead character has a sister with poor health.
And in the end, this was a wonderful first episode. There was a ton of different stuff that stood out here, but the most important part is that on top of having a ton of neat ideas, this also has an incredibly charming cast of characters. The acting isn’t as subtle as with Kami-sama no Memo-Chou or Usagi Drop, but the characterization is so well directed and colourful that these still are some of the best characters of the season. The different characters play off each other wonderfully, making actual good use that they’re siblings and know each other for their entire lives. Now, on top of that it has a smashing soundtrack, the best background art of the season (and it knows this), it has very strong direction, makes excellent use of repetition, it’s actually got a number of new visual ideas, the transformation sequences kick a ludicrous amount of ass, the plot twist in this episode was an awesome and unexpectedly delivered way to start the story off and the final second… just the final second. This series really knows how to combine its mostly light-hearted and enjoyable mood with dark plot twists. This. Has style. And what’s better is that there are still 23 episodes left.
OP: Perhaps a bit too mellow, but greatly stylish.
ED: Weird visuals and a great song
Potential: 95%

The Idolm@ster

Short Synopsis: Our lead character is a cyborg Frenchman wearing a frog suit and riding a unicycle for all we know.
Unlike Uta Prince, The Idolm@ster actually tries out something new. The problem is that I have no idea whether that new idea it’s trying out is actually any good or well executed. Here’s the thing: this series takes the format of an interview: we have a guy with a camera running around, asking questions of all of the idols in this series in order to establish everyone. The guy with the camera is completely bland and doesn’t even speak (seriously: all his lines are just subtitles), and in this manner this series tries to show its huge cast of characters. Now, there are several problems with that. First of all: this series isn’t really clear what shots are shot by an in-story camera and which ones are out-of story shots: the guy walks around, you can see the girls talk to him and answer his questions, but the view jumps around so much, even to shots that are just completely impossible to film with an actual camera. This series doesn’t establish which ones belong to the camera guy and which ones don, unless the lead character also possesses magical teleport powers or something. Second of all: this show has a huge cast. There are like, 20 different characters. This show tries to give character to all of them, AT THE SAME TIME. This first episode is obviously nowhere near enough to make them anything more than blatant stereotypes, and the voice actors didn’t really make things better, as they pretty much acted out the exact stereotype that their character was meant to represent. And yes, there are quite a number of annoying characters here. Still: this is something new and I at least appreciate this series for going in a bit of a different direction, and the chaos of this episode did have its charms beyond the annoying bits. I’m a fan of series with large casts when done well, but the IdolM@ster is really going to have to put in effort to make everyone step away from their stereotype. It isn’t impossible though: there is still hope.
ED: Unfortunately, this one turned out to be nothing more than generic J-pop.
Potential: 50%

Usagi Drop

Short Synopsis: Our lead character is forced to live together with his aunt.
Usually introduction episodes are meant to give a taste of what’s to come. With Usagi Drop though, things are very different from usual: it starts off with a funeral. It shows people together who normally would never be together, it shows them in mindsets they usually would never be in, and most of the people we saw here in this episode are likely to never appear again. It’s definitely an interesting way to open up a story, and this episode really showed some nice things you can do with that format. There already was a lot of implied character development, plus the characters played really well off each other. This was realistic. The drama was really subtle: there was none of the overacting you usually see in anime. This episode especially rocked in how it let everything play off naturally: it didn’t force anything: it just established its characters and gave them the opportunity to let things play out themselves. In the next episode we should really see the direction where this series wants to head for, but this episode sold me already. This is solid like Noitamina should be. Now all that’s left is to actually create a full story for 11 episodes. Plus, this series does deserve plus points for again including a main character who isn’t in his teens or twenties.
OP: Finally another series that goes back to Noitamina’s tradition of weird OPs. It’s quite a charming one.
ED: Relaxing song with pretty neat images
Potential: 85%

Nyanpire

Short Synopsis: Our lead character is a vampire and a cat.
Gonzo is back! Unfortunately, I do have to say that this is Bad Gonzo. This was just… very poorly produced and it looks more like the commercial for a crappy j-pop band. Here is the thing with this series: its episodes are only 4 and a half minutes long. Only 3 minutes are actual content. The rest consists of a 90-minute live action music video that’s supposed to be the ED. That’s 33 percent of this series! I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a big percentage completely devoted to OPs and EDs, but the worst part is that the ED is pretty much the worst ED of the season. The dancing and choreography are all terrible, in the “we try to be funny but totally aren’t”-way. As for the actual content… it was pretty dull. It’s understandable that the animation is very simple, but the acting was really bad as well. The entire episode was the main cat looking for food, but any attempt of it to be cute didn’t work thanks to bad voice acting and timing.
ED: Live action mixed with traditional animation doesn’t necessarily have to be bad. But here it’s utterly terrible.
Potential: 0%

Kamisama Dolls

Short Synopsis: Our lead character has a sister who can summon a god.
Here’s a show that realizes that it’s only got 12 episodes to work with! Dear god, it put a ton of stuff into just this one episode without feeling rushed (it does have very large mood-swings, though). It established the main cast, it gave them depth, it showed their background, it fleshed them out, it introduced the main villain and made him one heck of a force to be reckoned with, it did romance, comedy, action, mystery and adventure all together. This entire episode felt like a strong standalone thriller. The writing was rock-solid and the animation courtesy of Brains Base was excellent, the action scenes were awesome too and the few cliches that were there were made up by great characterization. It’s a bit of a shame that the promotional material only showed the main characters’ little sister: she’s like, the only teenager in the entire series so far, with the rest being adults.
OP: Holy crap, what a song! Ishikawa Chiaki’s vocals are amazing, the track itself is very inspired with this latin-ish theme and the visuals are based on a great visual idea.
ED: More traditional for Ishikawa Chiaki, but still a great song. Spoiling the next episode is a bit less of a good idea, though.
Potential: 90%

Morita-san wa Mukuchi

Short Synopsis: Our lead character is shy.
Ah, that figures. Morita-san’s episodes are only 3 minutes long. I was really wondering how the heck the creators were going to deal with this TV-series when the OVA already was ridiculously poorly produced. Having short episodes makes this slightly more bearable, but this remains a gimmick series: it’s entirely about the lead character being shy, and this episode just consisted out of a few typical scenes where shy people have problems with. Being shy myself, I can understand where the creators are coming from, but it all just feels way too shallow. It just lists these scenes with predictable outcomes, its comedic timing misses the mark completely and the characters are just one-dimensional stereotypes who are entirely dominated by their quirk. It had its charms and at least this was much more bearable than the OVA, but I still fail to see the point in watching this.
OP: Really feels like it was thrown together at the last minute.
ED:
Potential: 10%

Natsume Yuujin-chou San

Short Synopsis: Our lead character can see youkai.
Oh, it’s wonderful to see this one back again. It still has the dreamy atmosphere it always had, and the way this episode started off with another episodic story was great to get back into it again. It’s a basic, but very charming story about another youkai who met Natsume’s grandmother a long time ago, and this episode once again did a great job of showing her story while keeping things simple. It may not have been the best episode so far, but it had a lot to like. The animation still is really good, and this episode also stressed some of the character development that Natsume went through in the first two seasons. It’s a very relaxed episode that did its job really well. Oh, and it also was great to see Nyanko-sensei again.
OP: Well built up song with a good use of instruments, though the visuals are a bit unremarkable.
ED: Simple and relaxing, fitting this series perfectly.
Potential: 90%

Yuriyuri

Short Synopsis: Our lead character is a random junior high school girl.
Well, here we go again. Here’s the thing: this first episode of Yuruyuri wasn’t half bad. It’s an episode of a bunch of random junior high schoolers goofing off, but it had a number of good jokes, it made sure that its characters, while annoying, weren’t at least one-sided stereotypes and this pretty much was the best animation we’ve ever seen from Dogakobo. It could have been much worse, but the thing is: this remains a show in which nothing happens beyond the antics of a bunch of cute girls. I’m not saying that that on its own is bad, but those series tend to have one really, really big disadvantage: they get incredibly repetitive. Take A-Channel: it could have been decent but devolved into an onslaught of boob jokes and characters repeating their quirks over and over. Denpa Ona? Nice coming of age drama until the characters just kept repeating themselves and the horny aunt just kept hitting on the male lead. Astarotte no Omocha? Heartfelt until it couldn’t stop talking about panties and generic romance cliches. And the thing is: the first episode of Yuruyuri has yet to show any hint that it won’t follow the same path. It only had a few bad fanservice jokes, but you can bet your hat that once they run out of jokes they’ll start groping boobs on a daily basis. On top of that, the main character is a complete airhead. And while she was far from the most annoying airhead out there, there really is little what you can do with such a character in the long run.
OP: The usual generically upbeat j-pop song that will get annoying really fast.
ED: This just feels like the second part of the OP song…
Potential: 45%

Ikoku Meiro no Croisée

Short Synopsis: Our lead character gets to take care of a young Japanese girl.
Oh my god. That was almost too adorable. This was once again an unbelievable first episode. This time in the incredible undeniable charm that this episode has. This goes beyond being just cute: just about everything about the lead female is just ridiculously charming. The animation isn’t trying to be anything big, but it is really consistent and does a great job of bringing the cast alive, plus you can also see the amount of detail that has been put into the background art. The lead character isn’t just an ordinary character: he’s a blacksmith. His shop is full of all kinds of interesting designs and furniture and a lot of attention was put into making the art as authentic as possible. Heck, the creators even got a number of fluent French voice actors as the narrator and vocalists. I really have to say that Satelight are making brilliant use of their French roots and connections here. Overall: Sato Junichi did it again. This once again was brilliant characterization. Although I do have to say that it is very dramatic. It needs to take care not to devolve into melodrama as the show goes on.
OP: A bit of a mundane OP, but quite well animated.
ED: Adorable. Just… adorable.
Potential: 90%

Nurarihyon no Mago - Sennen Makyou

Short Synopsis: Our lead character leads the youkai.
Okay, this season is definitely being adapted by different people. This episode fitted this series much, much better. It’s like, an improvement in every way. You can really see that the director of Hyakko worked on this: it has the same timing, the same camera angles, and there are actually jokes put in the lighter moments that are really similar to Hyakko’s delivery (oh and for the record: I really liked Hyakko and consider it among the better high school comedies out there). What’s more though, the animation also really got an upgrade, and actually looks really good. Characters look less like cardboard boxes, and the creators even found a way to get Rikuo’s hair to move. Finally after Giant Killing we get to see again that Studio Deen DOES know to create some eye candy. As for the story: I have no idea whether or not it’ll be better, because this episode animated a chapter that the first season forgot to animate and inserted at the weirdest point in the final episode. Peoeple kept promising that Rikuo’s friends would play a much lesser roles in the later arcs, but this episode still was all about them, so I’m not sure where they think they’re going with this.
ED: Neat visuals, catchy instruments, though cheesy vocals.
Potential: 75%

Sacred Seven

Short Synopsis: Our lead character is the legendary hero who will defeat evil.
Here’s the thing with this first episode: this series needs 24 episodes. With that, it can make a great plot and cast of characters. Without it, it’ll probably have a difficult time. With this series, I really would have liked it if the creators put a big more imagination into the setting. I know who wrote this and the creators could certainly have been able to do something more than just another high school mecha show. But the thing remains that this episode was quite solid. The action is good, the characters are a bit emo, but with the right development they can really work (hence the 24 episodes) and it will probably make an entertaining, yet unremarkable series. The big problem is that it has very little that makes it stand out aside from small things like the OP and the fact that the main character is riding around on a very tiny motorbike. Those were really cool, but they also were just gimmicks. This show takes too many elements from other mecha series, and doesn’t even go with the most interesting ones. It lacks a signature, and will the creators be able to create this during the rest of the series?
OP: Yuki Kajiura delivers again.
ED: Yuki Kajiura delivers again.
Potential: 70%

Kami-Sama no Memo-Chou

Short Synopsis: Our lead character meets a girl who is Not in Employment, Education or Training and who works as a detective.
Holy crap. This was well written. I mean, heck: this was incredibly well produced. Rock solid in every single way. The premise of this series of yet another guy who finds yet another genius detective does far from justice to this episode. The cases and especially the dialogues are intelligent, the side-characters all are portrayed with exceptional detail and are miles away from the usual stereotypes. The story in this episode was great and really well built-up as well, but in particular it was the voice acting that really made this episode shine and bring the characters alive. This is a series which has episodes of 45 minutes, and it really makes use of that to make everything play out slowly. This was creative and the few jokes it put into this episode really worked. My only complaint is JC Staff forcing in their usual incredibly out of place fanservice shots at the end of the episode. They really need to stop doing that, because that was the only blemish on an otherwise consistently excellent first episode.
OP: Unremarkable music, but inspired visuals.
ED: Hell yeah, rock and roll really well done. Great visual direction as well.
Potential: 95%

Uta no Prince-sama Maji Love 1000%

Short Synopsis: Our lead character enlists on a school for idols.
This. Was camp. Heck, if you took four body-builders and made then play bagpipes while playing monopoly they still wouldn’t be as camp as this. I’m not sure how the creators did it, but they somehow succeeded in getting every single scene in this episode to not make any sense whatsoever. This show takes every reverse harem cliche, and takes it even further. The guys in this episode are completely ridiculous stereotypes, drawn by girls who I can only imagine haven’t spoken to guys in ages: that’s how ridiculously hammy they all were. Seriously,t his series takes bad acting to a new level. An sich, there is nothing wrong with campness: Antique Bakery did it and did this with great results. The thing however was that Antique Bakery had real characters. This is just a collection of badly acted stereotypes with an extra dose of sparkle. The one positive point is A-1: they made sure to make this show look good, plus the soundtrack too is surprisingly good. Whenever characters aren’t singing, though.
OP: This one is just… wrong.
ED: Again: it’s well produced, but the vocals are pretty bad.
Potential: 20%

Kaitou Tenshi Twin Angel - Kyun Kyun Tokimeki Paradise

Short Synopsis: Our lead character are magical girls who fight crime.
What the..? This is really weird: at first sight this series seems exactly like the OVA. In fact, the entire first scene was completely borrowed from the OVA. However, as the series went on, it became clear that there was one major difference that changes pretty much everything: they changed the villain! If you never saw the OVA you might wonder why this is such a big deal, but here is the thing: the OVA was meant to subvert the magical girl genre: it showed that fighting crime shouldn’t be taken lightly and it uses its far superior villains to teach the lead characters not to goof off just because they have special characters. In this episode however, the creators swapped this villain out for a bunch of total idiots. The result is that this series is now a really camp kaitou-series, with the bizarre effect that it tries to deliver a bunch of really weird scenes straight. This episode tries to take itself seriously while pulling a number of horses who have long since been beaten to death. This isn’t in the way most harems keep repeating each other. This episode was full of the plot devices that nowadays only appear in parodies. They’ve been long since beaten to death that writers don’t even bother with them anymore, and here this show comes and expects them to still make sense. It just doesn’t work, especially with all of the silly acting.
Potential: 20%

Blood-C

Short Synopsis: Our lead character hunts monsters.
Oh boy! Talk about a standard set for the rest of the season. This episode was rock-solid in every single way. Even the Noitamina series are going to have their hands full on trying to come close to the level of detail in this episode. Especially the big action scene at the end: now THAT is how you animate a fight scene. This episode also really screamed Clamp, but I really mean that in a good way. It has some of the elements that return in a lot of their other series, but also plenty of new stuff for them, not to mention the rock solid characterization. Saya is a teenager this time (who has nothing to do with the Saya of Blood+, by the way), but most of this episode was laid back and made excellent use of this to establish the main cast. They already seem like a unique bunch. Everything was really well acted, the pacing was really fluid, the characters are strong. All that’s left now is an engaging story. Please, someone say that this will go on for more than 13 episodes!
OP: A strong contender for the best OP of the year. Utterly gorgeous with music that fits it perfectly.
ED: Simple but effective.
Potential: 95%

Blade

Short Synopsis: Our lead character hunts vampires.
And the final installment of the marvel adaptations is Blade. Once again, a solid opening. It really seems like Iron Man was the bad apple in the series, because the others had some pretty good starts. Blade too: this episode was an interesting combination between horror and action, and it hit a lot of right notes: the animation isn’t as good as the X-Men, but it still convincingly takes second place: the action looks gorgeous and the images are very creative, especially that birth scene. The protagonist Blade kicks ass, the female lead looks to be an interesting co-star, the creators made the right decision to immediately establish and introduce the main villain, and there are no teenagers in sight. Oh, and this series of course also deserves points for having an actual black characters. It’s been ages since we’ve had one of those. Overall, this episode feels like it takes the middle ground in the Marvel franchise: it doesn’t have the animation nor setting of the X-Men, but on the other hand it also doesn’t have Hisako and it doesn’t try to pretend to be anything more than it is. On the other hand it doesn’t have the fight choreography of Wolverine, but the animation and acting is much better there (although there is still quite a bit of ham). If this gets done right and if it manages to combine the best out of the previous X-Men series, this could very well become the best in the series.
OP: Pretty much what we’ve come to expect from the Marvel-series, although I have to say that I like the designs a lot.
ED: Unlike the other Marvel anime EDs and a lot simpler. It works.
Potential: 80%

Rou Kyuu Bu!

Short Synopsis: Our lead character gets to coach a junior high basketball team.
Okay. Look. I have been looking forward to this season a lot. It’s promising to be an awesome season. But this was completely abysmal. In every single way. The creators did it: they somehow succeeded into making every single character a pain to watch. This is complete and utter fanservice with some of the most terrible script-writing, just caching in on popular trends. The voice acting is utterly terrible from the moment the five lead girls opened their mouths, and aside from that they all are completely stereotypical. The entire episode was just uninspired dialogue and fanservice over and over, but the worst thing is that it actually tries to take itself seriously: this episode kept hinting in the most unsubtle hints that half the cast has a dark past with some of the ham-handed build-up imaginable. This is pretty much the archetype of what’s wrong with modern anime.
OP: The song… is exactly the same as every other generic moe girls OP. Seriously, it’s like a direct copy with perhaps a bit of a louder drum base.
ED: Brings obnoxious to new levels.
Potential: 0%

Double J

Short Synopsis: Our lead character is a random high school girl.
What happened to the days of Hanoka, when the flash anime actually put some effort in their animation? Seriously, Double J is the latest in a string of utterly horrid Flash shows that could have easily been out-produced by a bunch of high-schoolers. I can only imagine how ridiculously cheap these are to make, and ever since Tono to Issho they just keep coming and coming, but there really has been an explosion of them during the past year (most of which I refuse to review). Double J is an evil one, though. It is a very evil one. Most of the episode was exactly what it says on the tin: random girls talking. It’s far from the worst of the genre because at the very least it didn’t try to deliver the most awful jokes with a straight face. But then the ED arrived and they showed that the producers actually DID get a really good animator for this show. Seriously, if the rest of the animation of this series was even a tenth of how good that was, I’d watch it. Instead we got these ridiculously cheap series that just hope that some random otaku find the girls cute enough to buy it…
OP: Just a random CG thingy that even I could have made with the right tools.
ED: Now this is some awesome animation!
Potential: 10%