A fetish is an unnatural desire towards a want or need, whether it be black underwear or leather straps or Hello Kitty. I bring this up, as “Ojisan to Marshmallow” (“Ojisan to Mashumaro”) is a caliber of fetish show, except our hero, Habahiro Hige, is drawn to marshmallows, and it is more than drawn, it is a compulsion. (more…)

I sometimes wonder why some shows get made at all, especially ones of this nature. I mean, not only is it four episodes (and a brief OVA), they don’t run that long anyway, so this is a Double-Double (Short Pull and Short Run). “She and Her Cat” (“Kanojo to Kanojo no Neko”, subtitled “Their Standing Points”) is about a girl (Kanojo) and her cat (Kuroneko) and how they interact with their time together. The biggest problem I had with this show is that I knew how it was going to end by the first episode, so I was just along for the ride. (more…)

Whew! At least we picked up the pace for the final installment of “Arpeggio of Blue Steel” (maybe; I can no longer tell if a series has truly ended any more), with “Ars Nova: Cadenza”. It’s musical history time. A ‘cadenza’ often refers to a portion of a concerto in which the orchestra stops playing, leaving the soloist to play alone in free time (without a strict, regular pulse) and can be written or improvised, depending on what the composer specifies. The final movie is like that, as so much ‘new stuff’ comes in, that we are left in its wake.

The good news is that this is a full and true movie. We have progressed beyond the cut and paste of “D.C.” and formed a real film, with all the twists and turns you have come to expect from a submarine chase film. The time has come to end this war. (more…)

We have before us another example in the current trend of ‘concluding’ a series with a movie or two. I mean, the same effort goes into a movie as a series, but I guess they feel they can control things better with a movie. I also have the lurking suspicion that they can trot out a ‘special engagement’ viewing party and charge far more at the cinema for this, with one of those ‘weekend’ showings….provided you live in or near a city that would do this. If you are in East Powdermilk, Wisconsin, you could be out of luck.

We are continuing the saga of “Arpeggio of Blue Steel”, with this offering called “Ars Nova DC”. Now, since we are dealing in musical terms, ‘Ars Nova D.C.’ might be confusing to those not so musically inclined. But if you know the terms, it explains the movie a bit better. ‘Ars Nova’ means ‘new art’, although we can take it to mean ‘new technique’ and it represents a break from the style of music that preceded it. ‘D.C.’ is ‘Da Capo’ meaning ‘from the beginning’. It is a notation to play a musical phrase from a certain point again, kind of like a repeat. This movie is all that and a bag of shrimp-flavored chips. (more…)

This show is presented as an OVA, but it comes off more as a one-shot, and a confusing one at that. “Big Order” (“Biggu Ōdā”) tells the story of Hoshimiya Eiji, but it is done in the most painful way possible as to make it nearly incomprehensible as to what is going on. He starts off talking about wishes and if you were given one wish, what would it be? He progresses through his normal, boring life in his normal, boring town, going to his normal, boring school and seeing the new transfer student (that’s her up there, Kurenai Rin). (more…)