Otaku Debate: Did the Summer Anime Season Suck?

Surprisingly, last week’s debate didn’t generate the knee-jerk negative reaction towards obesity that I expected. Most of the poll respondents said they preferred their girls anywhere from “meaty” to “slightly chubby,” which could be considered average weight for most people. It’s nice to see our readers have rejected the “thin = sexy” message of pop culture and formed more realistic standards of beauty!

This week’s topic is a bit of a painful one for me. In my humble opinion, this anime season has been a total letdown. Most of the shows, such as Seitokai Yakuindomo and Ookami-san, were just too bland to be worthwhile… and the few that showed promise, like Occult Academy and Highschool of the Dead, turned out to be total duds. The only show that’s marginally entertaining at this point is Mitsudomoe, but the very risque humor makes it appealing to only a small subset of otaku.

Now, I don’t think this means anime is doomed or anything silly like that. We’ve had bad seasons before, particularly in the early nineties after the last economic crash. Still, that doesn’t make it any less depressing to slog through such mediocrity. Has this season left you in a similar state of despair? Or do you think that I’m being overly negative? Are there any anime this season you did enjoy, or are you taking refuge in old classics like Dirty Pair and Gundam while this storm blows over? Vote in the poll below, and share your thoughts in the comment section!

(Just FYI: I consider K-ON!! to be a spring season show, so it doesn’t figure into this debate.)

[poll id=”17″]

Zaku Curry Noodles

What better way to show your loyalty to Zeon than snacking on these possibly delicious Char Aznable Spicy Curry Noodles? The noodles mimic Char’s cometary qualities with spicy and red peppers, with just a hint of cheddar cheese flavor thrown in for good measure. They even come with their own reusable glass Zaku II cup!

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Gundam Love

This otaku couple, who (along with their children) are huge Gundam fans, were the lucky winners of a matrimony contest and got the chance to take their wedding vows in front of Odaiba’s life-sized RX-78-2 Gundam. Naturally, local Japanese TV news picked up on the story…

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Gundam Unicorn Details Revealed

New details about the highly anticipated Gundam Unicorn (aka Gundam UC) adaptation, which returns to the Universal Century timeline of the original Mobile Suit Gundam, were revealed at Tokyo’s Big Gundam Expo on Friday. Unicorn has been confirmed to be an OVA series, with six 50-minute episodes, and been given a spring 2010 release date. Furthermore, Bandai will be releasing the series simultaneously worldwide (most likely online), meaning those of us in the English-speaking world will get to watch the OVA at the same time as our Japanese friends. This is the first Bandai series ever released in this fashion, so this marks a momentous event for both Gundam fans and anime fans in general.

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