What are you Watching?

[Drew_Sutton]

My fiancee is out of town for the week so one of my friends came over and we decided to live out a family Guy cut scene by enjoying bourbon and anime. He's picked up some stuff from the new season he really likes and wanted to show me, so I started watching Aldnoah.Zero, TokyoESP and Psycho Pass with him. He's also really big into Argevollen, so I'm going to try and catch up on that this week. Also checked out the first episode of Gundam Build Fighters; not sure I like it enough to do anything more than look for screen shots of all the Gundam-in-joke gags. Going to also try and power through a few things I've had on my backlog the last little while.

I really liked both Aldnoah.Zero (first 3 episodes in) and Psycho Pass (first extended episode). TokyoESP I am still a little on the fence with, though I'me more than willing to give it a few more episodes to see weather or not I really like it or not. It kind of feels nice to have a few shows this season that I can get excited about. Actually, it seems like the last couple seasons have been like that, which is a pleasant surprise.

[greg]

I've been marathoning my AnimEigo Macross DVD box sets while on vacation. I've had it playing on my computer while I've been working on plastic models. I'm about 2/3rds through.

My friend and I were talking about whether or not Macross would ever get the 2199 treatment. Perhaps it would look like this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZfvkJ1ISTfo

I sort of doubt that it could happen, though. So much of Macross is built around Minmay, and Minmay = Mari Iijima. She's reprised her role once for the ADV English dubs, but it seems that she's now sick of Macross and the fandom that has supported her all these years. If Macross were to be remade, would they have it with all new songs and such? I wonder...

[greg]

I just　finished watching Record of Lodoss War. I had restared this about a year or so ago, but I finally got around to watching the 2nd disc this time. I'm really interested in watching the TV series, "Chronicles of the Heroic Knight." I understand that it does not have the same production value or the atmosphere as the original, but I am interested in seeing it since it follows the original storyline more closely. There should be a period of about 10 years or so after Emeror Beld and King Fahn die. I've read the CPM manga of Spark's story, and I loved the artwork by Natsumoto.

While watching this version, I can tell the point where the first story ended and the second story arc, which involves Spark, was incorporated into the second half of this original Lodoss series. If you think about it, it does seem a bit rushed. Still, this classic anime is fantastic as a stand alone, and there is quite an appeal of drama with having Parn save Deedlit from Wagnard instead of Spark saving Neece.

[usamimi]

Drew_sutton - I heard good things about Aldnoah.Zero! I've been meaning to check it out. I really liked Psycho-Pass. I was thinking of rewatching the new "Extended" version just for kicks.

I've been really enjoying the series "Monthly Shoujo Nozaki-Kun"! I heard a lot of my friends talking about it, so I wanted to see if it was as good as they said and I was very pleased--it's so NICE to see a brand-new comedy series that doesn't rely entirely on fanservice humor. It's genuinely fun and funny, and reminds me a lot of 90s-style comedy anime, actually. Even my guy friends (and Nitro!) love it, so I totally recommend it.

I also started watching Shinichiro Watanabe & Yoko Kanno's new series, "Terror in Resonance". I've seen people complain that it's moving too slowly, but so far, I like it. Its intriguing, well animated, and the music is great. I'm looking forward to seeing more of it.

[PinkAppleJam]

I've jumped on the Crunchyroll bandwagon (I still find it hilarious that it was a streaming site, but so pleased about it's success for going legit), I'm currently watching Jojo's Bizarre Adventure (it's sense of humour is so wacky), and Black Jack TV. I prefer the moody Dezaki OAVs but it's still a great show with interesting plot twists. The internet's reaction to "bishie Black Jack" is hilarious.

Even though we can't get Hulu or the other avenues to watch Sailor Moon Crystal, we're watching them via NicoNico Douga directly which is a godsend. It gets a bit jittery-pixelly at some points but I tend to stream it upon release then stream it again a few days before the new episode. As an original fan via Nth-gen VHS and weird PAL Cantonese tape trades, it's amazing in itself to be able to watch it straight. I will forever moan about how the UK got shafted with Sailor Moon (a few eps aired terrestrially then swiped off to expensive cable channels), girls get a raw deal with cartoons in the UK because of our ridiculous Victoriana-attitude of the culture.

...Offline I'm watching Ashita no Joe (AnJ2 is on Crunchy but locked to US only), I've got the last few episodes to watch and looking forward to binging on those when I have a chunk of time!

[usamimi]

I've jumped on the Crunchyroll bandwagon (I still find it hilarious that it was a streaming site, but so pleased about it's success for going legit), I'm currently watching Jojo's Bizarre Adventure (it's sense of humour is so wacky), and Black Jack TV. I prefer the moody Dezaki OAVs but it's still a great show with interesting plot twists. The internet's reaction to "bishie Black Jack" is hilarious.

Even though we can't get Hulu or the other avenues to watch Sailor Moon Crystal, we're watching them via NicoNico Douga directly which is a godsend. It gets a bit jittery-pixelly at some points but I tend to stream it upon release then stream it again a few days before the new episode. As an original fan via Nth-gen VHS and weird PAL Cantonese tape trades, it's amazing in itself to be able to watch it straight. I will forever moan about how the UK got shafted with Sailor Moon (a few eps aired terrestrially then swiped off to expensive cable channels), girls get a raw deal with cartoons in the UK because of our ridiculous Victoriana-attitude of the culture.

...Offline I'm watching Ashita no Joe (AnJ2 is on Crunchy but locked to US only), I've got the last few episodes to watch and looking forward to binging on those when I have a chunk of time!

I prefer the Dezaki OAVs, too, but the TV show is still pretty fun! Jojos is quite the fun time. The latest episode was...something. XD

Yeah, I'm really glad that you guys in the UK can at least watch it on Nico-Nico Douga. It sucks that the UK seems to be one of the only places were Sailor Moon isn't readily available...I know in other European countries, Sailor Moon's been popular for years! (Italy, France, Germany...) Sigh. Licensing sure is a pain. :/

[llj]

Watched Burn Up! and watching Lain this week, two titles from the 90s I missed out on.

I was actually slightly disappointed by Burn Up! I wasn't expecting anything great, but I did expect some decent "girls 'n guns" mayhem on the level of Gunsmith Cats or Dirty Pair. The action scenes in this OVA aren't "bad" by any means but there isn't quite as much "burning up" as I was expecting. I was looking for lots of explosions and shootouts but there are really only 2 real action scenes in this OVA. I think even Cleopatra DC delivers more on this front. I know there are a bunch of Burn Up sequels but the character designs in this first one is much more appealing to me than the later ones, sort of like a poor man's Kenichi Sonoda. That said, there's nothing here that's actually outright *bad*. The story is comprehensible enough and the pace is all right. It's just kind of average though.

It's hard to put my finger on where Lain stands in terms of classic 90s anime. Clearly, it is an influential anime that built another variation on the internet post/neo cyberpunk anime movement that arguably took off with GITS the movie, but it's also a strange mixture of low tech and high tech. All of the technology in Lain is already out of date, and they were fictional! Watching an older cyberpunk anime like this really hits me how far we've come technology wise in the past 15 years. Wi-fi, smartphones, tablets...all of this stuff would have been considered sci-fi just 20 years ago. I don't know whether to be scared or awed. Maybe both.

[ParaParaJMo]

Saw the new Initial D movie this morning. It is a reboot of the first series and this movie concentrates on Takumi's first rivalry with Keisuke.

It sucks there is no MOVE, no eurobeat and they changed ALL of the voice cast members. Try to imagine a Cowboy Bebop reboot with a new voice cast that have no personality, no Kanno Yoko and worst of all, no jazz and that's what you get. I am sure people who watch this movie with no prior familairty with Initial D will maybe like it, but long time fans will probably not like it.

[greg]

Watched Burn Up! and watching Lain this week, two titles from the 90s I missed out on.

Hey, so did you get the premise of Lain? It's one of those series that many people say they had to watch a second time around to truly absorb it properly. I'd read in a William Gibson novel the idea of a neural network establishing itself once the amount of neural tissue in human beings in the population of the planet reaches a certain amount, and a collective consciousness would be formed.

Saw the new Initial D movie this morning. It is a reboot of the first series and this movie concentrates on Takumi's first rivalry with Keisuke.

Oh man, I've never seen much Initial D, but I am familiar with the soundtrack and such. It's a pretty poor idea to not have the same voice actors, either.

[llj]

Watched Burn Up! and watching Lain this week, two titles from the 90s I missed out on.

Hey, so did you get the premise of Lain? It's one of those series that many people say they had to watch a second time around to truly absorb it properly. I'd read in a William Gibson novel the idea of a neural network establishing itself once the amount of neural tissue in human beings in the population of the planet reaches a certain amount, and a collective consciousness would be formed.

I can't say I *completely* understand Lain's thesis as a whole, but I think I grasped enough of its individual ideas to grok where it was going with its premise.

That William Gibson idea seems like it's been used a lot of various forms in media. We've seen many examples of pop culture adopting the neural network system for other animals (rats especially) but very few seem to want to touch the issue from a human standpoint.