More Suzumiya Haruhi

I remember last year they released the Suzumiya Haruhi movie in Japanese theaters and [Mazui] made a cam fansub (meaning guy sneaks a video camera into the theater). Unfortunately, the video was slanted at 30 degree angle and terrible resolution, so I had to postpone my viewing till they released the DVD/BluRay in Dec 2010. I recently started updating all my old anime to 1080p/720p and came across this forgotten thing.

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After they trolled us with eight identical episodes in Season 2 of Melancholy of Suzumiya Haruhi, I wasn’t expecting any sort of masterpiece. Honestly, I’ve never really liked Suzumiya Haruhi’s character very much. Kyon, and more specifically Kyon’s seiyu Tomokazu Sugita, is the main reason I watch this series. His cynical commentary on everything Haruhi does is the highlight of each episode for me. So I guess it should please me that the movie is very Kyon monologue heavy and also much more Nagato centered.

What is strange is that Haruhi and Kyon have pretty much no development at all in the movie. In fact, Haruhi is absent from the majority of it, and her disappearance only serves as the plot driver. At first I was kind of annoyed by this, given that I expect to see some sort of development in their relationship. However, I realized that this movie is based off a single novel, so it probably was the novel used to develop Nagato. Makes a lot more sense if you think of it like that.

Haruhi disappears and Kyon needs to figure out why. There is some time travel and randomness and somehow Kyon ends up reverting time to go back to normal. I didn’t particularly like the plot too much. It seemed kind of stupid and didn’t make much sense to me. Then again, most of the storyline of Season 1 and Season 2 aren’t particularly interesting. It’s mostly the interactions that are fun to watch.

What I did like was how they portrayed Nagato as a super shy and embarrassed girl with a crush on Kyon. There’s always been that underlying feeling that the robotic Nagato actually is hiding a ton of emotion underneath her emotionless speech, but it all came flowing out here. The shift in character was so startling. I have to admit I really enjoyed it when she grabbed Kyon’s sleeve to keep him from leaving. That scene was probably the best part of the movie for me. It is somewhat sad though that even though Kyon seems to care a lot about her, he clearly is still focused entirely on Haruhi.

Serious Nagato
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Versus Shy Nagato
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Mikuru continues to annoy me. The only point where I liked her was when both her present and future self were there and Kyon refers to them in the plural “Asahina-sans”.

Kyon once again ends the movie in the exact same way. He has a long monologue in his head where he admits to himself that he in fact likes spending time with Haruhi despite the fact that she bosses him around. I find it strange that this is the EXACT same ending to season 1, with an almost identical revelation. Like I said earlier, I had hoped he would progress his relationship with Haruhi a bit more, but in the end it stayed pretty much the same. I tend to rate movies and animes heavily on the ending and the impression it leaves me with, and so this is quite the let down.

Overall, the movie was alright, although long as hell (2hr 40 minutes or so). I don’t think I will be re-watching it anytime soon though, unlike season 1 which has a few episodes I re-watched multiple times. I liked some of the dialogue and Nagato is now a lot more interesting. It’s a big improvement over Season 2 though, so when they inevitably milk the cash cow more with season 3, I’ll be here to watch it.

Nagato Final version, inbetween super serious and super shy
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Durarararararararararararara

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It’s taken me some time, but I finally finished Durarara this past week.

I really enjoy this style of opening, where they cycle through all the different characters. The studio Brains Base has done this style before, and I absolutely love it. At no point in the series did I feel the need to skip past this thing.

Heavy amounts of dialogue done in non standard ways. One of the things I think anime does extremely well is handling face to face dialogues. Instead of actually showing the people talking, the camera pans across random static images like a table, doorway, sign, etc. Although the original purpose was to save money by minimizing the number of animated scenes, it’s become somewhat of a trademark and something I really enjoy. In Durara, there is a lot of online/anonymous interaction, and so you get a significant amount of plot and dialogue through forums and chatrooms.

http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b118/stipe108/durarara2.jpg

The whole story revolves around having an enormous cast of characters living in the same city, and all their separate storylines somehow get intertwined. There’s a lot of flashbacks, hidden pasts, secret identity crap that goes on, and most of the time it works out pretty well. A few characters you see in the openings get very little attention (Shinra’s dad shows up for maybe half an episode, the policeman is there for like 5 minutes, etc) and other main character’s stories seemed a bit rushed.

The ending was a bit anti-climactic, in that nothing really happened. Everyone just sort of went home and lived happily ever after, so to speak. Not to say the ending didn’t make sense, it was just a little bit tame given all the buildup they had.

Overall, I’d put the anime near the top of my 2010 list, and is definitely worth a watch.

Amagami SS End

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Amagami SS finally finished up and I have to say it was an extremely enjoyable series. Like I said before, I normally get fed up with high school harem romances based on dating sim games. However, this series was able to keep my interest throughout all 25 episodes and I even was looking forward to when the episodes would come out. I will say both Sae and Rihoko annoyed the crap out of me, but luckily once their 4 episodes were done, you never saw them again. The other 4 girls had much better characters and story lines.

The only thing I would say was a bit unfortunate about this 4 episode reset system was that there was little time for character development of any sort. But then again, this is a harem not a single romance series so I guess that’s to be expected. I will say this is probably the best harem anime I’ve seen in quite a while.

Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann

Let’s all recall Code Geass R2 where Jeremiah is fighting Anya. He pilots some enormous nightmare mobile armor (for lack of a better word). Upon the mobile armor exploding in a flash of fire and explosions, his normal nightmare mobile suit comes charging out. Upon THAT getting destroyed, Jeremiah himself comes charging out of another explosion to deliver the killing blow.

Did not think it could get funnier than this

Little did I know that this was probably a reference to Tengan Toppa Gurren Lagann and is in fact child’s play when compared to the original

Was very wrong
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Gurren Lagann has been on my list of Anime to watch for some time now. I’ve heard comments on the order of “best mecha Anime of all time” so it was something I definitely needed to get my hands on. Not to mention I was eagerly anticipating the scene in which “Libera me” From hell would be used.

Row row fight the power

What I liked:

Absolutely loved the animation style. The ridiculous and over the top mecha style is extremely fun to look at. I’m a big fan of Anime that takes advantage of the fact that it is animated to diverge from the normal path. Whether this be drastically shifting the art style for a particular scene or deliberately leaving the scene in an unfinished state (at least, when it’s used sparingly and not as an excuse to cut animation costs). It really puts emphasis on certain scenes and adds dramatic flourish.

Intensity
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Fight scenes are great. Tons of action when needed and limited reuse of the same scenes. The battles were quick and to the point, with a clear victor most of the time. The thing that always baffled my mind is how bad guys have universally perfected the “teleport and run away so we can drag out the confrontation” technique. The last battle in particular is so stuffed full of things going on it is amazing to just look at screen captures. Everything about it just makes the Anime feel so badass.


This makes me want to beat up some little kids
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The major characters are all very well portrayed and likeable (exept Rossiu, that fucker irritates me). Simon is a innocent, nice guy shounen character that starts of weak but through determination and hard work becomes the strongest person in the universe. Kamina is quite possibly the sweetest character I have ever seen in any Anime, period. Yoko is of course there to prevent it from being a sausage fest and provide fanservice.

People die in this Anime. Sounds morbid but it’s true. If you’re going to engage in a war of the worlds between galactic super powers, somebody is bound to get killed. It is too ridiculous when everyone is saved due to miracle healing powers or some bullshit (I’m looking at you Naruto and Bleach).

Music is good. Opening theme is great, background music isn’t annoyingly repetitive, and climactic scene have appropriately epic music. I do with that they would have blasted “Libera me” From hell in one of the scenes, but I guess playing it quietly in the background is alright.

When people are acting emo, it is resolved by having someone punch them in the face. If only this worked in the real world.

What I disliked:

The stretch of several episodes with Rossiu being President and people rioting. It made absolutely no sense. The fastest way to eliminate racism and hate amongst the human race is to introduce an Alien race that is threatening to destroy your planet. I would have assumed in that situation people would put aside their differences and fight the common enemy (aka Independence Day style). Somehow, the people in this Anime act completely irrationally, which makes no sense to me.

People die in this Anime. Yeah, I liked this but I disliked how they pulled off some of it. I particularly disliked the final battle where, scene after scene, people sacrifice themselves to perform some extraordinary task or save someone. When it happens every five minutes, it loses impact and becomes stupid.


Simon being a beast.
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Overall:
This Anime is fantastic. This is definitely worth the time and is a must see for everyone. It definitely lives up to the hype I had heard beforehand and is vastly superior to any Gundam I’ve seen before. I’d defintiely say it is one of the best mechas out there, although I still think I enjoyed Macross Frontier a little more for the soundtrack.

Amagami SS

Allison, after bothering me for ages, finally decided to make her website and name it baconfriedrice. As the big time commitments in my life are now gone (these commitments being Allison and school), I figure I would use her website to resurrect my weblog, which I unscrupulously executed.

So Amagami SS.

Amagami SS

A harem anime based off a PS2 dating sim. I typically don’t expect much from these types of series besides the pretty artwork. I don’t mind watching them, but I lose interest very quickly.

However, there are some unusually appealing characteristics about this one. You have the typical high quality animation and as a bonus, one of my favorite seiyuu, Itou Shizuka is voicing the “main” girl.

Itou Shizuka

However, the real killer is the way they compose the story. The main man goes after one girl and only one girl. This continues for four episodes, until some sort of conclusion is reached. Then, the series undergoes a time reset and it repeats, but with a different girl. All the actions of the previous sections are erased and forgotten. Meanwhile, the remaining girls that are not the primary characters for that stage remain, providing support roles.

So why is this so much superior to the traditional high school harem where every girl wants a piece of the main character? It allows you to focus solely on the single girl and become emotionally invested in that relationship. With five girls all fighting over the attention of a single guy, it’s hard to take anything seriously. Essentially, Amagami SS is a bunch of miniseries, each given its own flavor by the personality of the girl.

Amagami SS

Plus, you get CONCLUSION. One of the things I hate about Anime is how they drag things out. Most of these romance animes are like watching Goku charge up his kamehameha wave. I absolutely love how the main character gets to know the girl, develops the relationship quickly, and finally seals the deal promptly.

Of course, it takes a bit of getting used to. Especially when you come to like a particular relationship and then suddenly it ends and is forgotten. However, you’ll find that the next relationship to be just as enjoyable to watch, despite it being drastically different.

I also have to at least mention this. The fan service in this series seems much more toned down than what I would expect. Yes, there are still the very convenient camera angles, bathing suit cameos, and bath scenes. However, they tend to flow much better with the story and don’t make me cringe as much. At least, it hasn’t gotten to a point where I want to smash the computer screen in.