Typically each week I save all my downloaded anime for a one-day straight watch, usually Sunday since everything minus Otome Amnesia is out and ready to watch. But I got bored and blew through five shows last night, and another three today, and I still have a wait on the rest. So I downloaded the first episodes of five more shows, Acchi Kocchi, Hyouka, Mysterious Girlfriend X (Nazo no Kanojo X), Sakamichi no Apollon, and Space Brothers (Uchuu Kyoudai). Typically I wait until the end of the season and batch-watch stuff I didn’t include in my usual twelve-show season, but then I usually keep one or two shows on deck to replace anything I am looking to drop. In this case, these shows were worth keeping tabs on. I’m not sure if I care to rework my power ranking chart for it though.
I’m embellishing a little in the caption, as this show is really a standard RUCKY STAR setup with a lot of transitions. Your standard character archetypes are also present, in the form of calm and collected Otonashi Io (Okamoto Nobuhiko), shy, fragile, but brutal (read: tsundere) Miniwa Tsumiki (Ookubo Rumi), cheerful and clumsy Haruno Hime (Fukuhara Kaori), and prank comedy duo Katase Mayoi and Inui Sakaki (Nabatame Hitomi and Asanuma Shintaro). It’s a run-and-gun slice-of-life, and frankly, I enjoy a good SoL show once and awhile just to entertain me. Not all of my animes need to be super serial.
TLDR Watch This: cute girls (and cute… boys? did I just write that?) doing cute things
TLDR Don’t Watch This: You suddenly were reminded of which way to eat a coronet.
Sub Group: Commie
First Rating: 7
I admit, I thought this episode was two, it seems like eternity the way it just went on about.. mysteries, or the lack thereof. Hyouka stars the apathetic school student Oreki Houtarou (Nakamura Yuuichi) who tries to live life as minimally as possible. Coining the motto “If I don’t have to do it, I won’t. If I have to do it, I’ll make it quick” he is intent on passing through school life without joining any clubs or being involved in any projects. Unfortunately his older sister blackmails him into joining the Classic Literature Club. There, along with his friend Fukube Satoshi (Sakaguchi Daisuke) they meet the enigmatic but cheerful Chitanda Eru (Satou Satomi) the daughter of one of the town’s famous four families, the “Exponential Four”. Together they aim to solve mysteries and rumors about the school, and uncover something from the club’s past. Kyoto Animation heads this one up, so you can expect a heavy dose of K-ON-inspired mash, but possibly more structured. Being someone who also practices the “energy-saving” ways of life, I can appreciate the delicious irony this show has to offer. At least I’d love to say that’s continued. More than one thing has derailed my plans.
TLDR Watch This: Light Reading Club
TLDR Don’t Watch This: Lack of a band
Sub Group: Commie
First Rating: 7
I had heard some musings about this show on Twitter but hadn’t investigated it until now, and seriously, what the fuck? Directed by Doraemon director Watanabe Ayumu and Starchild/Kodansha, it stars mild-mannered Tsubaki Akira (Irino Miyu) who lived a normal life until transfer student Urabe Mikoto (Yoshitani Ayako) comes in, and immediately becomes the strangest student in the class by falling asleep during lunch, and laughing uncontrollably. Then one day he finds her asleep after class and when woken up, she drools all over her desk. After she leaves, he decides to taste her drool, which tasted “sweet” to him. Weeks later he stayed home sick, and receives a visit from her, who takes some of her drool and shoves it in his mouth, saying he was “lovesick” from the lack of her taste. They eventually form a strange relationship in which she seems to have plans for him. Drool aside, this show has a very nostalgic animation feel to it, and the whole premise just screams Bakemonogatari, which also had Kodansha’s name on it, so go figure. I also managed to snag the manga for this off Nyaa, so I plan to give that a read as well, as I am very far behind in the manga scene.
TLDR Watch This: If you like the taste of drool
TLDR Don’t Watch This: Think Senjougahara was a better office supply ninja
Sub Group: Horrible
First Rating: 8
Japan. 1966. Nishimi Kaoru (Kimura Ryohei) transfers into a new school in Kyushu due to his father’s work. A pianist and intellectual, he has trouble adapting to other people and when trying to flee to the roof for sanity, he runs into school badass Kawabuchi Sentarou (Hosoya Yoshimasa) who fights three seniors for the keys to the roof, but doesn’t give him the keys. Mukae Ritsuko (Nanri Yuuka) being the class representative shows Kaoru around and also looks after Sentarou. As it turns out, they are childhood friends, and her father owns a record shop in town where he practices playing drums, favoring jazz music. Being more classically trained, Kaoru and Sentarou butt heads in the beginning, but after seeing him play, he buys a jazz record and starts to discover a different side to himself he didn’t know he had. I am kind of a history nerd, so when I saw the premise being Japan in the 1960s, I felt it was worth a watch just to see how much of the time period they would capture in the show. But jazz has always been a Pandora’s Box for me. I like listening to it, but I don’t seek it out like I do other music. So it’s interesting to see it as a focal point of a show this season.
TLDR Watch This: If Mad Men wasn’t enough 60s for you
TLDR Don’t Watch This: Wonder why he wears red and white like Waldo
Sub Group: Commie
First Rating: 7
Okay, I am going to be bias as fuck here, this show is awesome, because it is about space, astronauts, and NASA/JAXA. I’ve been a space nerd since I was a kid, and I was pretty mad I wasn’t able to go down to Florida for the STS-135 launch last year. I stayed up until 3-some in the morning though watching it land, complete with LiveATC feeds and shit. The shuttle program is a big fucking deal to me, and I loved watching PLANETES way-back when, so to see space get some love again in the form of Space Brothers, fuck man, that is awesome. Brothers Nanba Hibito (Kenn) and Mutta (Hirata Hiroaki) were born in 1993 and 1996 and grew up running around outside and idolizing space. After witnessing what they thought was a UFO, and meeting a famous JAXA astronaut, Hibito makes it into the space program and ends up assigned to the joint NASA/JAXA mission to the moon, billed as the stepping stone to Mars. Meanwhile Mutta becomes an automotive engineer and designs many successful cars, but is fired when he headbutts his supervisor who made a crass comment about his brother. Unemployed and blacklisted from being hired anywhere else, he is persuaded to take the exam to become an astronaut with JAXA by his parents and Hibito. Seriously, I geeked the fuck out on just the details they put into this show, from the patches and equipment, to the scenery and people in Houston. Even the English being used verbally and written means they actually cared, as opposed to some shoddy jobs like Symphogear. It was one thing ten or twenty years ago, but in today’s digital age, I wouldn’t get why any animation company that wants to depict the US or its people in a show can’t do so easily with a little bit of research. It makes it that much more watchable. Not all of us are gun-toting crazy people stuffing Big Macs in our face. I don’t even like Big Macs.
TLDR Watch This: SPAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACE
TLDR Don’t Watch This: You live in Russia and you’re laughing about how much NASA has to pay to get to its own goddamn space station. I’d laugh too, except when SpaceX gets up there, you won’t be laughing then.
Sub Group: Commie
First Rating: 9
So seventeen shows I suppose I am watching this season. Shit dawg. I hope the summer is a bit lighter. I am a sucker for time-sinking entertainment. You’re just lucky I’m burned out from Disgaea at the moment.
