What are you Watching?

[greg]

The biggest issue with DVD was that it just had a hard time doing proper reds and blacks, and a lot of older series actually had better quality LD releases in the opinion of a lot of cinephiles (Ideon is a great example of this). Blu-ray is far more capable when it comes to handling deep blacks and reds (of course it's still limited by your HDTV) but there's no reason why a proper Blu-ray transfer shouldn't be the best possible version of a series that gets a solid treatment whereas you could make a debate over LD vs. DVD in a lot of cases.

Wow, really? I had no idea. I never noticed any DVDs not displaying red properly, but then again, I am colorblind, so I don't trust my eyes and don't pay much attention to details like that.

I spent my birthday watching old anime I hadn't seen before or seen in a long time, so I watched:

Macross II 1-4 (didn't have 5 & 6)

Happy birthday! I haven't seen Macross II in a very long time. What do you think of this show? I barely remember this show, and I guess I was most impressed with the vehicle designs. I loved the Valkyrie design most of all, and I thought the mini Macross fortresses were cool.

[danth]

I spent my birthday watching old anime I hadn't seen before or seen in a long time, so I watched:

Macross II 1-4 (didn't have 5 & 6)
Dangaioh Vol.1
Junk Boy

You can't just say that. You have to tell us what you thought of each.

I especially want to hear your review of Junk Boy.

[Animusubi]

I spent my birthday watching old anime I hadn't seen before or seen in a long time, so I watched:

Macross II 1-4 (didn't have 5 & 6)
Dangaioh Vol.1
Junk Boy

You can't just say that. You have to tell us what you thought of each.

I especially want to hear your review of Junk Boy.

Happy birthday! I haven't seen Macross II in a very long time. What do you think of this show? I barely remember this show, and I guess I was most impressed with the vehicle designs. I loved the Valkyrie design most of all, and I thought the mini Macross fortresses were cool.

Macross II was actually the first Macross I had seen, I originally rented it at Hollywood video years ago. That was before I knew most hardcore fans actually hated it. I personally really liked it the first time around. Seeing it again a few days ago, I still like it but since I've seen most of Macross now, I can see why some people probably don't like it. I like the character designs, Ishtar, and Hibiki. I liked that the main character was a journalist and not an ace pilot, I felt it was refreshing. I like the overall design too. The songs can be a bit forgettable, but I totally hear the Shiro Sagisu-ness of it. I haven't finished it yet, so I can't really say overall if I will like it alot still or not.

I actually started the day off with some Maison Ikkoku, since it was Valentine's Day and all. I always enjoy watching it but I realized I really don't like Kyoko's dubbed voice. So I think I'm gonna rewatch it from the beginning in Japanese. Eventhough I think Mr. Yotsuya is hilarious in English.

I LOVED Dangaioh Vol.1. But I am a fan of most of the staff that worked on it. The story is a little bunk, but other than that it was entertaining and made me feel very nostalgic.

Junk Boy was the perfect way to end the night of anime watching! I thought it was hilarious. I loved the silly metaphoric banana! XD;; I honestly would watch a short series of this. I think I might pick up the manga somehow, I love that old style of art.

[greg]

Mouretsu Space Pirates.

Okay, so after watching Moeblobs Und Pander, I was cautious about this one. Girls in school uniforms, and even a maid cafe are featured in the first episode. If the episode started with the main character girl late for school, dashing out the door with a piece of jam-smeared toast in her mouth, then it would've exceeded the moe trope quotia and would have had more of an uphill battle to win me over.

But no, we are introduced to the main character, Marika, descending to earth in a space flight simulator. Then we find out that she's the child of some famous space pirates. Oh my, space pirates? Something that kick-ass needs to be handled properly, and if we have school girls and such, then the premise must be rather fantastic and the disbelief really needs to be stretched far. This is where Girls Und Panzer fell short. Mouretsu Space Pirates (or Miniskirt Space Pirates, or Bodacious Space Pirates, or pick whatever title you think it should be called) has a fantastic premise and detatches the viewer further away from reality to a place where you can actually imagine high schoolers in space, flying their own starships and such.

I've only watched the first two episodes (thanks to somebody on YouTube who will likely have his/her account terminated in the near future for copyright violations), but so far, I like it! I first learned about this show from finding the plastic model of the ship. The characters are interesting, the premise is interesting, and I intend to watch episode 3 soon!

My gripe: as with nearly all fansubbers it seems, this Kiss Anime group puts English text either along with or on top of the Japanese text. Gosh, just STOP IT, people! All you need to do is make a footnote subtitle. Quit screwing around with the animation!

[Heero]

I've only watched the first two episodes (thanks to somebody on YouTube who will likely have his/her account terminated in the near future for copyright violations), but so far, I like it! I first learned about this show from finding the plastic model of the ship. The characters are interesting, the premise is interesting, and I intend to watch episode 3 soon!

Wow, I guess we are destined to completely disagree on "cute girl" shows (aside from K-On I guess). While I found Girls Und Panzer to be entertaining (albeit, disposable) fluff, I could NOT get into Bodacious Space Pirates. I watched the first 2 episodes and just could not get into it and found it boring.

Still currently enjoying Log Horizon.

[greg]

But... there's space ships involved! SPACE SHIPS! And SPACE PIRATES!

[SteveH]

Gundam Build Fighters. Every old school, old gen, watched 4th gen cloned episodes of raw Japanese Zeta Gundam fan should be watching Gundam Build Fighters.

But if you can't stand obvious plot movement, coy cameos and MELODRAMA x 1000, don't bother, you're not cool enough to get it.

Gundam Build Fighters is like fresh hot pancakes with plenty of butter and syrup. And bacon. It's comfort food. Nobody can be grumpy eating pancakes and no sane person can be grumpy watching Gundam Build Fighters.

That is all.

[greg]

Mmm... bacon. You know, one thing I miss from America is breakfast at Denny's or IHOP. Buttermilk pancakes are TEH NOMZ. I can't even buy buttermilk here to make my own. I have a Denny's-ish recipe that calls for buttermilk, but I just use heavy cream instead. It's nice, but not quite the same. Denny's and Coco's in Japan have only Japanified stuff for breakfast.

So Gundam Build Fighters... It's been mentioned on here before (I forget who). Predictably, it has spawned its own plastic model line. If it truly isn't a silly kid's show as I assumed it to be, then I will give it a shot.

It's been a weird week with my daughter catching the flu. TGIF, and tomorrow morning will be Saturday morning cartoons time. I grew up with that tradition, but with cable TV eventually making it a moot point sometime in the '90s, that tradition disappeared. However I make a point to let my daughter enjoy this. We have a backlog of Keroro Gunsou to catch up with (she hasn't been watching it this week due to being sick), and she's surpassed the part my wife and I had watched up to with fansubs long ago. (Did Funimation or whoever was releasing it on DVD give up on that series? I should look it up when I am at home and not at work.) Somebody mentioned a Macross spoof episode of Keroro on here. Does anybody know which episode it was? Apparently Harmony Gold blocked that episode for North American release.

Anyhow, I hope to sit and watch some Cobra I recently obtained. It looks like we've lost track of GS Mikami for now.

[SteveH]

Mmm... bacon. You know, one thing I miss from America is breakfast at Denny's or IHOP. Buttermilk pancakes are TEH NOMZ. I can't even buy buttermilk here to make my own. I have a Denny's-ish recipe that calls for buttermilk, but I just use heavy cream instead. It's nice, but not quite the same. Denny's and Coco's in Japan have only Japanified stuff for breakfast.

So Gundam Build Fighters... It's been mentioned on here before (I forget who). Predictably, it has spawned its own plastic model line. If it truly isn't a silly kid's show as I assumed it to be, then I will give it a shot.

It's been a weird week with my daughter catching the flu. TGIF, and tomorrow morning will be Saturday morning cartoons time. I grew up with that tradition, but with cable TV eventually making it a moot point sometime in the '90s, that tradition disappeared. However I make a point to let my daughter enjoy this. We have a backlog of Keroro Gunsou to catch up with (she hasn't been watching it this week due to being sick), and she's surpassed the part my wife and I had watched up to with fansubs long ago. (Did Funimation or whoever was releasing it on DVD give up on that series? I should look it up when I am at home and not at work.) Somebody mentioned a Macross spoof episode of Keroro on here. Does anybody know which episode it was? Apparently Harmony Gold blocked that episode for North American release.

Anyhow, I hope to sit and watch some Cobra I recently obtained. It looks like we've lost track of GS Mikami for now.

Oh, it IS a silly kids show. It's made to sell Gundam kits and paint markers and stuff. It's totally above board and honest about this. It's Pokemon, Gundam Flavor. Each week brings Our Heroes closer to be the BEST GUNPLA BUILDERS IN THE WORLD (tm).

And it's wonderful. It's so old school it's new.

Why, just this past week we had a BIG REVEAL where Our Heroes discover that the cute, moody girl one of them is kinda sorta liking (not that he likes her or anything!) is in reality ONE OF THEIR MAJOR FOES (exactly like in Zeta Gundam where Camille discovered that Four was the pilot of the Psycho Gundam that attacked Hong Kong...and so on )

(mind, we the viewers knew it all along, the thematic tension in the story is waiting for Our Heroes to discover it)

But nobody gets hurt, only plastic models get damaged.

There are all manner of fun little nods and winks in the show. Mr. Ral is a friend to Our Heroes, a slightly chunky older man who happens to be a dead ringer for Ranbal Ral from MS Gundam. Who happens to hang out at a Gunpla club with a bunch of Jion pilots.

I have no idea how long the show is going to run. It feels like it's heading for a 26 episode conclusion but obviously Bandai needs more time to sell models, so maybe there's going to be a 'Build Fighters Zeta' followup or something.

It's harmless. It pushes all the right buttons. It has plenty of 'inside jokes' if one loves Gundam or plastic model building. In a vast ocean of MOE crud and soulless 'by committee' shows it's rather fun and imaginative.

[llj]

Space Adventure Cobra TV. As always, Nozomi's presentation is top notch. Excellent video quality (Nozomi is the only U.S. anime company that keeps episode counts at 4 or 5 at most per DVD, so video quality is often very high, though I'm not sure if they're using single layer discs--I suspect they have begun to use dual layered these past few years).

Anyway, the show is very fun as I anticipated. I had watched the 1st two episodes before, but it's nice to see the show sparkle like this with the remastered video. From episode 3 and on (I haven't finished the storyline yet; I'm up to episode 7), the show retells the Crystal Boy/Bowie and triplets storyline that was done in the movie...but it's told very differently in the TV series, and the sister characters have significantly different character designs compared to the movie. I'm glad about this, I was slightly worried that they would simply elaborate on the movie version and reuse footage from it (which was released in theatres only a few months before this TV series) for this storyline, but as far as I can see this is a complete retelling from the ground up.

Greg, I think you'll have fun with this show when you watch it.