Category Archives: Season Reviews

2010 Anime Oscars: Jon’s Picks

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All winners get a free golden statue of Natsuru in a maid outfit.

Well, the 83rd Oscars are over, and once again Japanese animation has been totally overlooked by the Academy. I’ve decided to remedy this by holding my very own totally legitimate Japanese Animation Academy Awards. These Anime Oscars will cover all the shows and OVAs that finished airing in 2010, as well as any films that were released on DVD (and therefore fansubbed) during that year.

Now, keep in mind that these are my personal choices… I’m sure the other writers for this site will have their own picks to share. And if you put together your own list of Anime Oscar winners on your blog, please let us know in the comments! We’d love to read it.

More below the break!

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I Told You So [Madoka Spoilers]

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The only good emissary of evil is a dead one.

So, remember when I made that post a while back warning everyone that Kyubey was not to be trusted?

Well, guess what? I was right.

Maybe I had a bit of an advantage over my fellow Project Haruhi staffers, since I watched all six seasons of LOST. Maybe that experience made me far more willing to believe and attempt to validate crazy fan theories. Or maybe I’m just completely nuts and have lost all sense of rational thought.

Whatever the reasons, I totally called all the so-called “twists” in episode eight, and I’m going to break down how I did it.

[Warning! Spoilers lurk after the break!]

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Bakacast Loves You YEAH!

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The Noitamina shows skipped a week, but we managed to make this episode over an hour and half anyway. That’s the dedication the Bakacast staff has to giving you as much commute-filling audio as possible.

Instead of reviewing Wandering Son and Fractale, we discuss Funimation’s downgraded lawsuit and Borders filing for bankruptcy, and we add Hokago no Pleiades and Break Blade to our review segment. Also, I’m trying something new with this week’s podcast. In addition to including timestamps in the show notes, I added chapter markings in the ID3 tags. The only problem? Not a whole lot of audio players can read ID3v2 chapter tags yet. So if yours can (and you find the chapter tags useful), please leave a comment.

We cover:

  • 01:08 – Funimation drops 1336 lawsuits
  • 09:21 – Borders claims Chapter 11 bankruptcy
  • 16:00 – Hokago no Pleiades
  • 26:49 – Break Blade #3
  • 45:27 – Madoka Magica #6
  • 56:45 – Gosick #6
  • 1:11:35 – Level E #6
  • 1:18:16 – Star Driver #19
  • 1:26:52 – Macross Frontier #7 & #8

4koma War Opening Shots – Nichijou Trailer

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War. War never changes.

There is tension in the air. The plebeians are dishing out the latest Puella Magi Madoka Magica speculation as their voices are muffled by the silence before the storm. The otaku fandom is anticipating the spring season, the new shows it will bring…

But war never changes.

Every war starts with a spark. Every war starts with mere taunts. The 4koma war is no different.

It’s a battle to the death between A Channel and Nichijou, two upcoming slice-of-life shows competing for the same 4koma-style comedy slot in the hearts of otaku. But will it be a brutal melee of moe, comedy and death… or a mere skirmish, soon forgotten by the ever-fickle anime fandom?

To state it bluntly, this doesn’t look like it will be much of a war. The people at Studio Gokumi have nothing but Koe De Oshigoto! (an anime about a high school girl becoming an eroge voice actress) to back them up. They must be out of their minds to try and challenge the anime juggernaut that is Kyoto Animation, or have a lot of confidence in the A Channel franchise. All things considered, they don’t stand a ghost of a chance.

Nevertheless, when Gokumi launched its first rocket in the direction of Kyoto, the men and women (but mostly men) behind The Melancholy Of Haruhi Suzumiya and K-ON! responded with a new trailer for what will undoubtedly be their newest cash cow franchise to rule them all. Let’s take a look, shall we?

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I’m Sick of GOSICK

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ALL OF MY HATE

Oh, GOSICK, how far you have fallen. Not all that far, actually, since you never managed to climb very high in the first place. It’s been like scurrying up onto a small fence and then toppling over backwards off a cliff. Poorly written similes aside, this show is becoming enjoyable on a level much different than I would have ever expected. It’s like a mix of Detective Conan and Commando at this point. With the right mindset, that has amazing potential.

So let’s dive into episodes four and five of the best unintentional comedy anime of the season.

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First Impressions – Suite PreCure

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Tee-hee sparkle sparkle!

Sometimes, you just need to think like a teenage girl.

I’ve been meaning to start watching PreCure after Sailor Moon introduced me to the wonders of magical girls last year. Like its predecessor, PreCure is one of those shows that everybody has heard of but nobody has seen. In Japan, it’s a hugely popular merchandising juggernaut aimed at little girls, much like My Little Pony in the United States. Perhaps because of its target audience, it has never received much attention in the Western otaku community. Regardless, with a new PreCure show just starting up, I figured it was the perfect time to see what this franchise is all about. This review covers the first two episodes.

From the very first scene, Suite PreCure dives headfirst a Power Rangers style black-and-white moral morass. Mephisto, the evil ruler of the musically themed Minor Land, is trying to steal the notes of the Melody of Happiness in order to transform it into a Melody of Sorrow. When the queen of Major Land scatters the notes all around Earth, Mephisto sends his transforming cat/girl minion Siren to retrieve them. However, Major Land’s adorable mascot Hummy manages to thwart Siren by transforming two girls, Hibiki and Kanade, into Cure Melody and Cure Rhythm. Thus begins the musical battle against the forces of sadness!

More after the break.

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Bakacast – Breaking a Maiden’s Seal

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Hey, guess what? It’s Bakacast’s first birthday! To celebrate this momentous occasion, Glen and I break the record for most sex euphemisms in one episode. Yes, we’re rather proud of ourselves.

Other than that, though, it’s business as usual for our reviews. We gush about Level E and Star Driver, pick Gosick apart, wonder what the hell Fractale is trying to do and come up with new conspiracy theories about Kyubey. The Twitter questions, however, are not quite as predictable. What do I mean by that? Well, let’s just say I somehow managed to turn a fairly fluffy query into a long, detailed discussion of unfortunate trends in anime and the ideas that spawned them.

I apologize in advance, but I’m an English major. I can’t help it.

We cover:

  • Madoka Magica #5
  • Gosick #5
  • Level E #5
  • Fractale #4
  • Wandering Son #4
  • Star Driver #18
  • Macross Frontier #5 & 6

Bakacast – Galactic Pretty Girls

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That’s right, I finally put a Star Driver reference in the episode title. It only took me 17 episodes.

Anyway, Jon had to sit this one out and Larry was sick, so it falls on Glen, Thomas and me to pick apart the absurdities in Gosick, gush about Level E, try and figure out what the heck Fractale is trying to do, speculate on how one becomes a female pretty boy, and declare our undying love for Sheryl Nome.

Also, Ranka’s spirit of ambition inspires Glen to “sing” at the end of the podcast. Enjoy the results.

We cover:

  • Madoka Magica #4
  • Gosick #4
  • Level E #4
  • Fractale #3
  • Wandering Son #3
  • Star Driver #17
  • Macross Frontier #3 & 4

Bakacast – The Super Dimension Podcast

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For this week’s episode of Bakacast, we bring in Scott from Otaku in Review as a guest host to help us lament how stupid Funimation is to prosecute BitTorrent users. Oh, and I guess we talk about some anime, too. Prepare for Madoka speculation, more rants about Gosick, an in-depth look at how Level E sure got sexy, and the Star Driver Love Party™. Also, we begin our semi-retro-review of Macross Frontier.

We cover:

  • Madoka Magica #3
  • Yumekui Merry #3 (dropped)
  • Gosick #3
  • Level E #3
  • Fractale #2
  • Wandering Son #2
  • Star Driver #16
  • Macross Frontier #1 & 2

See you next deculture!

Weekly Anime Review: You Got Trolled [SPOILERS]

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Behold, the latest edition of Weekly Anime Review! Surprisingly, we’re actually managing to keep on a somewhat consistent schedule this time around. Now all we have to do is apply a bit of elbow grease, and you should have a new WAR post pop up in your RSS feed every Thursday evening! Hooray!

Since I reviewed two episodes of Madoka last week, there’s no recap for this week’s episode. Fear not, however, as it will return in the future. Any other show that’s absent has probably been dropped. For more detailed information on which shows we dropped and which we never bothered writing about in the first place (i.e. Rio Rainbow Gate), check out the last couple of episodes of Bakacast.

Spoilers lurk beyond the break, so tread carefully. And don’t forget to leave your thoughts in the comment section!

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