Bakemonogatari

[Kagami]

One of the series which caught me out this season was Bakemonogatari, a new anime series animated by SHAFT. Bakemonogatari is a dark and interesting anime about an ex-vampire called Araragi Koyomi and Senjougahara Hitagi, a girl who has lost all her weight. Both are school students and what links them together is Koyomi's discovery of Hitagi's weightlessness. Hitagi's hostility at Koyogi discovering her secret is offset by his confession to a dark past, and he agrees to help her regain her lost sense of being.

The things that immediately stood out in this series was the slow, stilted and hypnotic means of plot development, the smart dialogue and the cryptic animation styles. Multiple weird view angles and random images make up each episode breaking up the standard flow of the story which is continually conveyed by dialogue from the main characters. In HD it makes for a fantastic watch, and not just for the excellent art style but for the casting and quiet music as well.

The first episodes OP highlights the different animation style which luckily did not put me off, since this kind of story ain't what I usually watch. This OP is replaced by the official OP which stars some amorous staplers.

[Kagami]

The bakemonogatari OP. It's a pretty good song, and I like the vid as well since it tells a story.

Will post more details later, but now I gotta go to uni.

Go watch~

[Taiga]

Yaaah.... this is damn awesome!

I think I may have found a new thing to obsess over 8D

That one scene in episode two before they go to see Oshiri the second time... PURe, UNDILUTED, WIN!

[KAITO]

I would watch it, but my computer seems to be having internet issues. If this message got posted, I'd be most surprised, actually.

[Kagami]

Well get them fixed! In the meantime here is an ED mad that shows the animation style and quality of the show. I like the song alot too.

Clicky Clicky

Next episode airs soon...

[Kagami]

The latest episode of Bakemonogatari has another OP and its pretty good once it gets going.
WATCH IT!! O_O

However, for the episode itself, number 10, all the talk on Random curiosity and other websites about SHAFT not completing the animation was bang on. From about the midpoint onwards its basically watching freeze frames, there is nearly zero actual animation. How they could slip up this bad is beyond me, because the first half of the episode was very good. SHAFT has used blank cutscenes from the very beginning of the series, and after a while they blend into the theme of the show, with every episode so far having fairly good animation in between the scenes.

Not so for this episode. From the snake exorcism onwards, we see hardly any animation at all, only the sound. Some of this is because of censorship I believe, but the rest is probably due to SHAFT blowing the budget on the awesome OP and snake writhing scenes.

No Senjogahara either ><

Still, this is probably a series I am going to get the DVD of, just for the finished product.

[Taiga]

No Senjougahara? Damn.

I haven't sen this ep yet, but I'd heard bad things of the episode. I certainly hope the DVD version is, indeed, more completely animated. I plan on getting this series in the future anyway, for the simple fact that part of it is being streamed online, not on TV.

[Sinistromanual]

I suppose SHAFT has been working on several different projects at the same time, so don't have as much time and/or money to spare and have to makedo with those kinds of standards.

That's what I've heard, though, so...

[Taiga]

Actually onl that one episode was all that bad. The recent ones have all been webcasts though, sadly...and at random times of the year: August(?), October then February.

[Kei]

SHAFT is notorious for their bad scheduling. They're always running out of budget and delaying their shows.

[Taiga]

So utterly worth it though. The latest episode had me in fits of ':3' smiles

[Sinistromanual]

I'm not a fan of Yui Horie, but...

Spoiler:

Even I found Hanekawa's "nya~"s cute, gah. ):

[Kagami]

Due to my being here, at the end of earth plane and the edge of the known universe, I haven't seen any Bakemonogatari beyond the first webcast episode. That said, I am looking forward to a PS3 so I can get watch the Blueray version of the series...which hopefully constitutes the finished product.

[Sinistromanual]

Do X-Box 360s support the Blu-ray? I'm not sure, but out of the newgen consoles, I only have one of those.

[Kagami]

I'm not the person to ask, either. I know current generation xbox360 consoles don't support blueray, but who knows in the future...

[Sinistromanual]

Hrrrmmm, and I don't have a DVD to support it.
I'd get a part-time job to earn money to fork out on a PS3, since I want to get one anyway, but I'm too young. >:

[Kagami]

Too young to have a part time job?

[Sinistromanual]

Yeah. I asked around a bit, and it turns out that people don't tend to hire people younger than 16, either because of lack of experience or it's not actually legal.

I'm not sure which.