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I want you all to know that I waited to play Dragon Age 2 so I could get the podcast edited immediately. You see the sacrifices I make for you people?

Anyway, we’re a little lighter on reviews and heavier on news because of the terrible one-two punch of natural disasters that recently hit Japan. If you’d like to help out, the link on the top of the sidebar will take you to a list of large and trustworthy organizations (such as the Red Cross and Salvation Army) that you can donate to. Since plenty of news organizations have covered the disaster better than we can, we instead focus on what it might mean for the short-term future of the anime industry. And on a lighter subject, we discuss FUNimation’s HorribleSubs gaffe. After our typical review segment (minus the Star Driver love party, sadly), we go off on some of our wildest tangents to date thanks to your seemingly straightforward listener questions.

• 2:04 – Earthquake aftermath
• 13:07 – FUNimation uses HorribleSubs
• 20:15 – Madoka Magic #10
• 25:03 – Gosick #10
• 31:25 – Level E #10
• 38:26 – Fractale #8
• 47:13 – Wandering Son #8
• 56:16 – Macross Frontier #15 & #16
• 1:11:00 – Listener questions

I reference a couple things during the listener questions segment that you might like to check out. Fast Karate for the Gentlemen ripped apart both the anime and live-action versions of Blood: The Last Vampire (be warned that, unlike Bakacast, they use explicit language). As for the “Cage Rage” podcasts I mentioned, you can find every single one by clicking these handy links. Consider them your course materials for Nic Cage 101. There will be a test. It will not be open book.

If you would like to submit listener questions for a future episode, you can email them to bakacast[at]projectharuhi.net, @reply them to Project Haruhi’s Twitter account using the hashtag #bakacast, or leave them in the comments below.

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Yo! I know Dustin usually does these things, but I decided to try my hand at editing the podcast this week just for the experience. Naturally, given my predilection towards batsh*t insanity, I did something totally silly and nerdy with the sound design. If you can guess the anime I’m parodying, you win 100 Baka Points.

This week, we start of by discussing Jake Adelstein’s recent fight with National Geographic over their Gangland Tokyo documentary. You should really go read his blog post on the subject, which paints a disturbing picture of NatGeo’s flippant attitude towards journalistic integrity. After that we plow straight through our regular reviewing regime. Dusty even gets a chance to share his thoughts on my favorite guilty pleasure show of the season, Suite PreCure! Finally, we answer a couple of in-depth e-mail questions about our ratings scale and the upcoming live-action Akira adaptation, before finishing off with the usual onslaught of silly Twitter questions.

• 3:10 – Jake Adelstein vs NatGeo
• 12:19 – Madoka Magica #9
• 20:24 – Gosick #9
• 28:27 – Level E #9
• 34:40 – Fractale #7
• 40:47 – MORNING RESCUE!
• 41:14 – Wandering Son #7
• 48:55 – Star Driver #22
• 53:54 – Suite PreCure #5 (with special commentary by Dustin)
• 1:01:30 – Macross Frontier #13 & #14
• 1:11:00 – Listener Questions (Here is the 10-point scale John Crichton submitted.)

If you would like to submit listener questions for a future episode, you can email them to bakacast[at]projectharuhi.net, @reply them to Project Haruhi’s Twitter account using the hashtag #bakacast, or leave them in the comments below.

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Thanks to a sudden onset of responsibility that’s more surprising than any episode of Madoka Magica, I’ve managed to edit and post this episode of Bakacast a mere two days after we recorded it. Now to reward myself by totally slacking off again.

Sadly, Jon is absent from this episode on account of being kidnapped by ninjas. While we wait for him to escape their clutches, we happily accept the newest ending of OreImo as the best ending,  somehow relate Dick Cheney to Gosick, give our first unanimous perfect score to Wandering Son, and tell Star Driver to go sit in the corner until it’s thought about what it’s done. Also, we discuss Jon’s Anime Oscar picks while Glen informs me of all the awesome stuff I missed this season.

We cover:

• 3:10 – OreImo #12 [True Route]
• 10:48 – Madoka Magica #8
• 23:59 – Gosick #8
• 34:45 – Level E #8
• 41:22 – Fractale #6
• 46:00 – Wandering Son #6
• 53:04 – Star Driver #21
• 1:04:11 – Suite PreCure #4
• 1:08:57 – Macross Frontier #11 & #12
• 1:15:39 – Anime Oscars discussion

[That fabulous Star Driver comic is based on this comic by Kate Beaton. You should read her stuff, because she’s awesome.]

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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

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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

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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

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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!

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The bad news: Jon was captured by Doctor Wattsman and couldn’t be on this episode. The good news: that means it’s Glen’s turn in the spotlight, and he bombards the latest episode of Gosick with a rage-fueled rant of magnificent proportions. And though the Gosick discussion may be a little one-sided, Wolverine gives us a perfect opportunity to do what we love: tag-team mocking. If you happen to be nostalgic for the days when we reviewed Highschool of the Dead, this may be the episode  for you.

Also, Twitter questions make a triumphant and uncomfortable return, as we relate our first experiences with the adult side of Japanese entertainment and discover that my mind has been hopelessly corrupted by being Jon’s roommate for nearly four years.

We cover:

• Fractale #1
• Wandering Son #1
• Kore Wa Zombie Desu Ka #1 (dropped)
• Madoka Magica #2
• Yumekui Merry #2 (on thin ice)
• Wolverine #2 (dropped)
• Gosick #2 (on thin ice)
• Level E #2
• Star Driver #15