Make no mistake about this one: Judy Garland is NOT on the other side. This is a brutal, rough, vicious show that takes no prisoners. It is also rather rare in that it examines the Post-WWII life ofJapanand how the war really changed both people and society.

It starts out in July, 1956 and six boys are being transferred to the Shōnan Special Reform School. They are hooded and chained together and are treated like scum and villainy, especially when they have to board a public bus to get to the school. The brutality starts almost immediately when one boy is beaten for trying to return a doll to a little girl who dropped it and no one does anything about the punishment meted out to him.

Once in their cell, after a most humiliating jail processing procedure, they have to confront Sakuragi Rokurouta, who challenges them all to a fight to see who will be the top dog in this little group. Our six other prisoners are:

Minakami Mario, 17, attempted homicide.
Maeda Noboru, 16, serial theft (dine-and-dash crimes.)
Nomoto Ryuuji, 17, fraud scams. (more…)

This series has always perplexed me, as it is a mere TWO episodes. Again, billed as an OVA, it covers, more or less, Book Three (the manga runs for about 18 issues). But it comes off as not much more than a test run. It starts from nowhere and ends up nowhere and you honestly do not enjoy anything in between.

It tells the story, ostensibly, of the life of schoolboy Densuke Mifune, who is a transfer student into the ZashonoAcademyIsland. This is a massive educational complex, handling students from Kindergarten through college (about 56,000 total people). On the first day, he (literally) runs into Chiharu Shinonome, who is possessed of the biggest bustline you have ever seen (and, no, she is neither of the two people at the top). Densuke, being your typically dense anime male, squishes Chiharu’s breasts like he’s kneading bread, much to the anger and chagrin of the rest of the male population, who want to be able to do that as well. (more…)

Most animes run in ‘seasons’ of 12, 13, 24 or 26 episodes. All of those numbers make sense to me. 13 episodes (or weeks) are one-quarter of a year. I accept 12 episodes, as you will lose a week to some holiday special (“The Death Note Christmas Show”. I’d love to see that one, especially when Light and L sing carols together). I would even accept 50 episodes (that’s almost a whole year, with one week taken up by eating lots of turkey and another one for a break away from the murder and mayhem, to reflect upon this most joyous of times. Then, we can return to the murder and mayhem.)

It’s the shorter ones that have me scratching my head. Sometimes it works (“Planet of the Beast King”, 11 episodes), sometimes it doesn’t (“Golden Boy”, six episodes, somewhat self-indulgent), but there are some that are so short, do they even count as a show? What is it that they get such a miniscule amount of shows? Was there a budget crisis? A test run? Some kind of a bet? Nothing else to do?

The first one in question is “Jungle de Ikou” (or “Jungre de Ikou”; I’ve seen both spellings). Now it gets billed as an OVA, but don’t you have to have a series BEFORE you have an OVA? Is there some kind of anime rule or regulation I missed on this?

The story is fairly simple (more…)

Utawarerumono. The title translates out to “Those Who Are Sung About”. Sing? I can’t even pronounce the title and try to rhyme that word with something. (“Utawarerumono/You look good in a kimono”) Terrible jokes aside, this is mostly a good series, but with a wretched sell-out at the end.

It is another AUHD, taking place in the past, in a land that is familiar and strange, at a time that is noted but not remembered with people who are famous but nameless. Man, could I get any vaguer? In the rural countryside, walking down the road we see Erurū and Arurū, sisters…who are also wolves or foxes, I can tell (they have ears and a tail, but I flopped that part of biology class). They come upon a man who was beaten by bandits and left for dead. He wears a mask that cannot come off and has no memory of his past.

Taken back to the village, he is restored to health and given the name Hakuoro. He learns that (more…)

OK, you should know right up front that this is my most favorite anime. So, the question arises as to whether I can give a balanced review without getting spotty about it (“It’s the greatest anime ever!!!!!!!!!!” “It stinks.”), so I will do my best to be objective.

The plot is pretty straightforward, even if the title gets muddled. (Is it “Mahoromatic” or “Automatic Maiden” or “Mahoromatic Automatic Maiden”? Rightstuf.com calls it “Mahoromatic”, so that is the standard). Mahoro Ando is a combat android, made by Vesper, an organization formed to do battle against the invading alien forces of Saint, who are bent on world conquest and domination. With hostilities currently at a standstill, they are decommissioning Mahoro (actually, retiring her). But she gobbles up too much power and if she remains in combat mode, she will last another 17 days. However, if they can remove almost everything, it will extend her life 395 days, but she will only be at about 30% of her previous capacity. The big question is: what does she want to do with this extra time? She decides that she wants to be a maid to the son of her commander, whom she was forced to kill.

However, the son knows nothing about what his father really did, thinking he was killed in an industrial accident overseas. Suguru Misato has been living on his own for four years, and that’s the time since his father was killed. His mother was killed by a hit-and-run driver two years before that, so by the age of 14, he has had a very rough life when Mahoro shows up. (more…)

Rosario + Vampire  equivalent to fanservice +monsters

Personally as someone who is intrigued by most things vampire I had to watch this series.  This show is about a boy , Tsukune, whom is not able to get into a decent high school and ends up in a special school that is full of various monsters. He quickly meets up with Moka, a vampire, and falls for her and she falls for his blood…oh I mean him as well.  There is tons of fan service throughout the entire series and is no exception to when they first meet by Tsukune being run into by Moka on a bike.  Moka switches between two different personalities throughout the show by her Rosario being removed by Tsukune whenever he ends up in danger.  His danger is most often due to the fact that all the women in the school seem to fall for him, and because the school has a rule of not showing your true form most are none the wiser of him being human. (more…)

If you have been reading my stuff for a while (you HAVE been reading my stuff, right?), you know of my predilection for Romantic Comedy. I had been hearing a lot about “Peach Girl” and felt I should check it out. Too bad it wasn’t ripe enough for me. (And how can you tell that a peach is ready to enjoy? The best way is by looking for a yellow ground color. The peach will also have medium-soft flesh and will smell like a peach.)

This light reverse harem show tells the tale of Momo Adachi (she is called ‘Peach Girl’ as she has a marvelous tan; all that swim team practicing). She is in love with Kazuya “Toji” Toujigamori (or Boy 1), but she also has feelings for Kairi Okayasu (or Boy 2) and she cannot decide between the two. Both fill her up emotionally, but both are equally demoralizing to her spirit, so she runs pillar to post with these two.

Adding fuel to the fire is Sae Kashiwagi (or, closer to the mark, let’s call her Sai Cotic). She spends an inordinate amount of time spreading lies and made-up facts about Momo, to make certain that it’s Momo fighting Boy 1. Or Momo fighting Boy 2. Or Momo fighting the world. And Sae doesn’t even care to date the boys; her goal is to humiliate Momo while pretending to be her ‘friend’. It doesn’t matter. I say it’s spinach and the hell with it.

(more…)

The Big Three

Throughout history, there had always been something about being part of The Big Three; to be considered that powerful or famous. There have been a lot of Big Threes in story and song (or Triple Alliances or Triumvirates or whatever fancy term you opt for.) When you talk the Big Three in automobiles, it’s Ford, General Motors and Chrysler. In sports, it would be the Miami Heat triad of LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh (who did a similar crash-and-burn like the auto makers did). And in history, the real, genuine Big Three came from WWII with Churchill, Stalin and Roosevelt.

Anime has its own Big Three, and I refer to them as NOB: Naruto, One Piece and Bleach. But this is one NOB I won’t be turning.

Now, this is not a decision I reached without reason. I was never up to my pancreas in Naruto cosplayers at an anime convention, or unable to navigate the manga aisle at Borders, as all the One Piecers are there, reading, reading, reading. I gave these shows the full benefit of the doubt and I was treated shabby for my efforts (not even “Fantastic Children” was this rude to me and I barely made it to the closing credits for them).

Let’s start with “Naruto”. (more…)

Okay, so to start off here is my disclaimer. I’m not exactly the best out there at neither rating shows nor have I seen every anime movie out there (reason why I called it Façades to 10 anime list and not just ’The Top 10….”). What I have here is my personal list, if you disagree, leave a comment also if there’s a great movie that isn’t there please give your recommendation, I possibly just haven’t seen it and hey I’m always interested in looking at new shows J. Another note, this list consists of Anime Movies and not OVA’s so more than likely, if there is a corresponding series for a movie, it will not be considered. Okay enough stalling, here we go! (more…)

Perfection is the only word that comes to mind when I try to describe this movie, while it itself is relatively old (1998) the years have done nothing to diminish from the luster it presents. Although I have been hearing about it for many years now, I personally only saw it recently and I believe that would be a result of my first impression being that is was somewhat childlike and boring (probably due to seeing the big walking chicken feet castle in the trailer). I finally decided to watch it (had nothing left on my pc I had not seen) and to my pleasant surprise it is now hands down my favorite animated film, replacing Princess Mononoke for the number one spot, both directed by the prominent filmmaker Hayao Miyazaki.

The movie is set in a pre World War I setting where magic and sorcery is incorporated in everyday life and revolves around a young 18 year old girl called Sophie who was transformed into a 90 year old lady due to a witches curse. Sophie ventures out in attempt to find someone to undo the curse and encounters a magic scarecrow who leads her to meet Howl, an extraordinarily powerful but infamous wizard who was rumored to eat the hearts of beautiful women, Calcifer, a powerful fire demon who powers the Castle and enables it to move and Markl, the young apprentice of who often creates potions and spells for Howls customers. (more…)