The Old School Otaku Lounge

Akage wrote:Haven't really picked up too much from the Fall season yet except Diabolik Lovers More Blood. Such a guilty pleasure. I did finish Himouto! Umaru-chan and Makura no Danshi from the summer season. HU is a gag series and it was entertaining, and MnD...I'd only recommend that if you're a fujoshi and you like this kind of stuff.

After being prompted by a friend and some sake while at YaoiCon this year, I just finished Love Stage and I'm halfway through Sekaiichi no Hatsukoi.

I was surprised at how much I enjoyed Umaru-chan! Nitro liked it even more than I did, though--probably because Umaru's gaming & snacking habits are very similar to his own!

I'm so behind on everything right now because I've been busy. I still have 1 or 2 eps of My Love Story!! left, same with a few other things I think (I can't even remember! orz). I did watch the first eps of the new Gundam series (!!! It's so cool to have it simulcasting!!), as well as the first ep of One Punch Man, and both seemed cool (the animation in OPM was especially good). There seems to be a bunch of interesting things coming out his season, but I'm not sure when I'll get a chance to try em all!

I still need to watch the new Vampire Hunter D dub for my upcoming podcast ep. I'm curious to see how it is, seeing as Sentai isn't really known for it's dubs....like....at all. lol

ryoran wrote:Curse of the Undead Yoma

There's a title I've not heard of in a long time! I think I remember last watching it back in middle school; did it ever get a release in North America? I remember not liking it very much but I also admit I remember very little of it.

Shortly after my last post, I ended up ordering a bunch of DVD and BR from AnimEigo and Discotek, half joking about blowing the rest of my 2015 Anime Budget in one day. Some of it was delivered this week, so this afternoon I sat down and watched Dagger of Kamui, which I swore I'd seen before but this film was rad. I must have gotten it confused with something else and I don't quite understand how. The film dragged for a few brief scenes but I ended up really enjoying it. And man, that soundtrack! I really dug it! There are a few songs from there that I want for when I am at the gym.

Also watching a little bit of Harlock '78; started from the beginning for completeness' sake and as a refresher since I watched some of the fansubs from the early 2000s.

Excited for but have not seen yet, One Punch Man and have heard nothing but good things about Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans. Looking forward to getting to those this afternoon or this week.

usamimi wrote:I was surprised at how much I enjoyed Umaru-chan! Nitro liked it even more than I did, though--probably because Umaru's gaming & snacking habits are very similar to his own!

My initial concern with any of the 'imouto' series is was going to go down the incest route, so I was happily surprised to see that this was not the case. Not that I have a problem with incest-route series, but I think the older brother/younger sister pairing has been used too much as of late. It left a bitter taste in my mouth with No Game, No Life, and that was largely because the younger sister is 11...so...eww.

I did like Umaru's snacking guide regarding how to eat chips and drip cola properly. I was really tempted to buy her nendoroid.

Have you read the Umaru manga, usamimi? It's very cute.

Akage wrote:

usamimi wrote:I was surprised at how much I enjoyed Umaru-chan! Nitro liked it even more than I did, though--probably because Umaru's gaming & snacking habits are very similar to his own!

My initial concern with any of the 'imouto' series is was going to go down the incest route, so I was happily surprised to see that this was not the case. Not that I have a problem with incest-route series, but I think the older brother/younger sister pairing has been used too much as of late. It left a bitter taste in my mouth with No Game, No Life, and that was largely because the younger sister is 11...so...eww.

I did like Umaru's snacking guide regarding how to eat chips and drip cola properly. I was really tempted to buy her nendoroid.

Have you read the Umaru manga, usamimi? It's very cute.

YEAH, I was really hesitant at first because of that as well. I have a baby sister, so the concept of those stories always gross me out so badly. I was VERY happy that wasn't the case at all for it! Someone basically forced me into watching the 1st ep of NGNL at a con a 2 years ago and I agree that it was pretty awful. >__<

I've only seen random bits of the manga, but it did look really cute!

I watched the first episode of Himouto! Umaru-chan and was pleasantly surprised. Glad to hear that others are enjoying it as well!

ryoran wrote:I want to watch some horror anime for this month too, though not too gorey, I'm really not into it. So I'm probably gonna watch Laughing Target, Mermaid's Scar, Curse of the Undead Yoma, and Demon City Shinjuku, on Halloween. Then end it with the Darkstalkers anime.

Thanks for reminding me! I bought Demon City Shinjuku on DVD a month or two ago, didn't watch it, and sort of forgot about it. But now's the perfect time to toss it into the DVD player.

And, speaking of Darkstalkers, I'm looking forward to picking up Discotek's re-release. Just wish Capcom would give us another game!

So I got around to watching the final episode of Saint Seiya Omega (episode 97, an odd number to end on) and I'm watching the BIG FINAL FIGHT between the protagonist and the Big Bad, and 5 minutes in I say to myself "these guys are gonna punch each other naked, aren't they?" and sure enough...

Omega was an OK show, but not something that inspired fevered passion to watch the next episode. Soul of Gold was MUCH better, more interesting and exciting. Maybe being only 13 episodes and thus it had to be lean and mean in its storytelling was the difference.

Bandai must have given up on both shows, not much support in the Myth Cloth EX line for either. Wish I could find a EX Gold Saint Leo that wasn't $300.

Finished watching Lovely Complex. This was a show that got some praise when it came out, and the manga has its fans. It pretty much was what I expected, although the protagonist is quite a bit funnier than most. She's definitely one of the more memorable heroines in the realm of shojo.

Originally written by Sentionaut on 2015/10/18, 22:10:48 PDT :

Re: What are you Watching? :

Was a toss up between the Patlabor Movie and Record of Lodoss War OVA. Opted for adventures of Parn company. Halfway through so far, and I don't know if I'll move onto the TV series afterward. I recall Chronicles of the Heroic Knight being more slapstick fantasy than I feel up to watching, and I never got around to buying the spin off Crystania on DVD.

So, I might just end up watching some of the first season of City Hunter later instead as I recently saw the first live action episode of Glass Heart, which was entertaining in its own way.




Originally written by Daniel on 2015/10/19, 15:45:17 PDT :

Re: What are you Watching? :

Finally got around to watching a little bit of Dragon Ball Super. Managed to get through the first two episodes, at least.

Well, the voices will definitely take some getting used to.

Can't say yet whether I like the show or not...




Originally written by usamimi on 2015/10/20, 07:58:58 PDT :

Re: What are you Watching? :

quote Daniel Finally got around to watching a little bit of Dragon Ball Super. Managed to get through the first two episodes, at least.

Well, the voices will definitely take some getting used to.

Can't say yet whether I like the show or not... quote

Did they change the seiyuu from the original cast? I thought they got most of them back for the show.

I haven't watched any yet because I'm still holding out hope that it'll be available legally....someday..........




Originally written by Drew_Sutton on 2015/10/20, 16:09:38 PDT :

Re: What are you Watching? :

quote usamimi

Did they change the seiyuu from the original cast? I thought they got most of them back for the show. quote

I know a few members of the original cast have passed already, notably Suzuoki Hirotaka, but I believe most of the core cast is not only still alive but still working. I can't imagine a Japanese-language Dragonball product without Nozawa Masako voicing any of the Son men.

quote usamimi I haven't watched any yet because I'm still holding out hope that it'll be available legally....someday.......... quote

I have been, too, but I can't imagine what level of ineptitude is keeping this from being streaming worldwide. If there was anything close to a License To Print Money TM in the anime industry, it's gotta be this!




Originally written by greg on 2015/10/20, 22:58:30 PDT :

Re: What are you Watching? :

quote Sentionaut Was a toss up between the Patlabor Movie and Record of Lodoss War OVA. Opted for adventures of Parn company. Halfway through so far, and I don't know if I'll move onto the TV series afterward. I recall Chronicles of the Heroic Knight being more slapstick fantasy than I feel up to watching, and I never got around to buying the spin off Crystania on DVD. quote
No, not at all. It's not slapstick fantasy like Slayers or anything. Lodoss TV is serious, but just skip those stupid SD animated shorts at the end of each episode because they add very little to the show and basically ruin the serious mood of the show.

The trick is to watch the OVA up until the part where they defeat Karla the Witch, and then start watching the TV series. The TV series starts at that point, but just realize that they introduce Orson and his companion as new characters at this point whereas they had already been introduced in the OVA. Oh yeah, and the first episode of the OVA is supposed to happen after the 4th or 5th episode or so. Gosh, they don't make watching Lodoss easy for us!

I ought to get back to watching the rest of the TV series...




Originally written by Char Aznable on 2015/10/21, 20:04:23 PDT :

Re: What are you Watching? :

I started watching Another. I'm three episodes in and not quite sure how I feel about the series thus far. It hasn't really pulled me in yet and many aspects feel very cliche but, unless it takes a serious dive, I plan on watching the remaining 9 episodes.




Originally written by SteveH on 2015/10/21, 21:27:30 PDT :

Re: What are you Watching? :

I am watching One Punch Man and having the time of my life.




Originally written by Sentionaut on 2015/10/21, 22:07:18 PDT :

Re: What are you Watching? :

quote greg No, not at all. It's not slapstick fantasy like Slayers or anything. Lodoss TV is serious, but just skip those stupid SD animated shorts at the end of each episode because they add very little to the show and basically ruin the serious mood of the show.

The trick is to watch the OVA up until the part where they defeat Karla the Witch, and then start watching the TV series. The TV series starts at that point, but just realize that they introduce Orson and his companion as new characters at this point whereas they had already been introduced in the OVA. Oh yeah, and the first episode of the OVA is supposed to happen after the 4th or 5th episode or so. Gosh, they don't make watching Lodoss easy for us!

I ought to get back to watching the rest of the TV series... quote
Yeah, I ended up tossing in the first disk after I watched about half of the OVA. The little SD closers were stuck in my head as my overall impression of the show, granted I'd not seen it since I bought the DVDs...2002 ? . So, I was pleasantly surprised when the tone was still equal to the OVA. I'm enjoying the Heroic Knight.

On a more October themed note, I've selected both Witch Hunter Robin and Argento Soma as my series to watch. Knocked out 10 episodes of Soma, and 1 ep of Robin so far. I've always liked the OP ED for Robin, and the entire soundtrack is memorable for Argento Soma. The latter series, I only watched the once as I bought each disk when they were first released. So watching it now is a treat as it's pretty much the same as if it was the first time I'd seen any of it. Though the music was familiar in a nostalgic way.

What I find interesting, is the character designs on both series mainly omit noses from any view but profile. I didn't look up the designer, though I don't think they're the same. But, the series are both from right around 2000, so it might be a sign of that era. Honestly, even with the limited aspect ratio, the visuals hold up fairly well even on an HD display. Lodoss was harder to watch on a widescreen tv, though that might be the crappy transfers on the old dvds.

I think my favorite thing about tossing in some of the Bandai Visual and Pioneer Geneon old releases is watching the trailers that are included on the discs. That always brings a smile, and ends up with me digging through my collection as I'm reminded of shows I haven't watched in years.




Originally written by usamimi on 2015/10/22, 07:28:11 PDT :

Re: What are you Watching? :

quote SteveH I am watching One Punch Man and having the time of my life. quote

That series is GREAT and I'm really loving the anime so far. Also the JAM Project opening theme is sooooooo goooooood!




Originally written by Daniel on 2015/10/22, 18:58:59 PDT :

Re: What are you Watching? :

Dragon Ball Super voices... Well..........

Yea................

Ye--------a................

Many voices are familiar, but........ Not quite the same for someone who is used to watching the original 80's and 90's series and who hasn't really been keeping up with the wave of new Dragon Ball stuff coming out. All this new stuff is more something of a curiosity than something I really follow. Not sure how long I'm going to keep watching Super. Probably not much longer.

And episodes are streaming, like, all over the place...

P.S. We've hit 100 pages on this topic!




Originally written by SteveH on 2015/10/22, 21:02:18 PDT :

Re: What are you Watching? :

quote usamimi quote SteveH I am watching One Punch Man and having the time of my life. quote

That series is GREAT and I'm really loving the anime so far. Also the JAM Project opening theme is sooooooo goooooood! quote

It's funny, I'm just not into manga. I know per Daryl Surat I would probably love One Punch Man the manga but it just does nothing for me.

OTOH the anime is just FUN. It's Giant Robo kind of shout at the screen fun.




Originally written by Daniel on 2015/10/24, 08:15:29 PDT :

Re: What are you Watching? :

Four episodes were enough to satisfy my curiosity for Dragon Ball Super, so putting that one down for now.

Instead picked up and watched through Anju and Zushiomaru.




Originally written by SteveH on 2015/10/24, 09:52:58 PDT :

Re: What are you Watching? :

Lupin III Part IV what they're calling the 'first shown in Italy' new series is pretty awesome so far! That OP animation rocks so hard it's not fair.

There are a few rough spots here and there, the chara design sometimes gets a little lazy in that 'animation made for someplace other than Japan' way it's a hard thing to really nail in a description but you can always spot it when you see it ... OK, I mean it's like sometimes, sometimes, it looks like someone trying really hard to imitate early '80s Miyazaki.

OK, really best way to try and fumble my way thru describing, it occasionally looks like that batch of Sherlock Hound that was made long after Miyazaki had left the project. How's that?

It's not BAD, it won't pull most people out of the viewing experience, it's just a thing that pops out to my eye.

I kind of miss the rough and scratchy chara work seen in 'The Gravestone of Jigen Daisuke' but that wouldn't work in these stories. And poor Fujiko just looks pissed off all the time. Like she knows she's not gonna get to do much in the show so she's just going thru the paces and cashing that paycheck.

The ED song is...old school. Actually, the ED is VERY confusing to me. Rather than the usual 'cycle' of something under the credits, or series of pans or fades over stills, it's almost a music video. I'm assuming that's supposed to be the actual singer of the song being animated highly idealized of course The song itself strongly reminds me of the ED themes from any number of '80s anime series, Urusei Yatsura first and foremost.

Yep, Lupin III Part IV pushes all my buttons. I'm buying it when it comes out on R1 DVD.




Originally written by Drew_Sutton on 2015/10/25, 19:29:22 PDT :

Re: What are you Watching? :

Watched Wolf Children, which was loaned from a friend, and man that film was great. The praise that Hosoda has been getting for his films as of late is well deserved.




Originally written by Daniel on 2015/10/27, 09:51:47 PDT :

Re: What are you Watching? :

Taro The Dragon Boy




Originally written by Drew_Sutton on 2015/11/02, 16:08:33 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

Yesterday was rainy and dreary, so I sat down and watched some Captain Harlock and Orguss.




Originally written by DKop on 2015/11/02, 18:04:04 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

I spent my pre-Halloween night watching John Carpenters The Thing for the first time in 8 or so years.

As for non anime I have been getting into The Man in the High Castle on Amazon Prime video, and watching old X-Files episodes on Netflix. I am actually pretty pumped for the new X-Files to return in January. I have not been a big X-Files fan until the past couple of weeks, so it does have my attention.




Originally written by Kame-Sen'nin on 2015/11/07, 22:23:54 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

Currently watching Maison Ikkoku after picking up some tapes on sale. Crossing my fingers that Viz will rerelease this show on Blu-ray!




Originally written by greg on 2015/11/08, 17:22:53 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

Yesterday, I watched my new Robot Carnival DVD with my daughter. I haven't watched this movie in such a long time! Now that I think of it, Streamline showed the short stories out of order for some reason. That's Uncle Carl for you, I guess. I still can't figure some of the short stories out, but I figure that they are more just for presentation and not so much for making sense of. I think my daughter's favorite one was Starlight Angel.




Originally written by davemerrill on 2015/11/10, 18:59:05 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

We just finished Perrine Story! Enjoyed it a lot. I was iffy on whether or not it was going to hold our interest for 53 episodes but it totally did. Might have to start Anne Of Green Gables next. Also watching One-Punch Man, which is a lot of fun, and Osomatsu-kun, which is funny, but at times too inside-baseball in terms of cultural gags. That first episode was a hoot, though.




Originally written by Akage on 2015/11/11, 16:21:36 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

They're apparently nixing the first episode of Osomatsu-san thanks to latest kerfluffle regarding property rights. Because the first episode parodies several properties such as Attack on Titan , Uta no Prince-sama and several classic Toei Animation series, the version released on DVD and Blu-Ray will be an entirely different episode.

Even Crunchyroll has deleted the first episode from their line-up. If you want to see the original first episode, you'll have to go to streaming or torrent sites.




Originally written by Animusubi on 2015/11/20, 15:15:12 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

I'm keeping up with One-Punch Man, which is hella enjoyable right now though I felt episodes 6 and 7 really slowed down too much .

I'm also slowly making my way through Yu Yu Hakusho.




Originally written by SteveH on 2015/11/23, 19:39:57 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

One Punch Man is so much fun! I could see the room erupt in hoots and hollers had this been a fixture of '80s and '90s anime fandom.

I wonder where the definitive Satima cosplay is going to show up. The one fan who sets the bar SO HIGH you can't really see anyone else anymore.

Can't be Daryl Surat, he can't take his glasses off or he's blind as a bat, like me.




Originally written by llj on 2015/11/27, 11:02:01 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

Finished Moribito. A pleasant anime diversion--solid animation and decent world building. Haven't watched a lot of anime in the past 4 months.

I bought a copy of Future Diary on BD this week as a 'blind buy', so I'll get around to that soon. Anime is getting expensive again. The worst thing is that anime is worth almost nothing in the used DVD BD market. So if you get one and you don't like it, you're basically stuck with it. If they're not rare, they don't go for much online and many used DVD retailers don't even buy them either. So it's getting to be that I don't buy anime if I'm not at least 95 sure I'd like it.




Originally written by usamimi on 2015/11/29, 08:16:52 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

quote greg Yesterday, I watched my new Robot Carnival DVD with my daughter. I haven't watched this movie in such a long time! Now that I think of it, Streamline showed the short stories out of order for some reason. That's Uncle Carl for you, I guess. I still can't figure some of the short stories out, but I figure that they are more just for presentation and not so much for making sense of. I think my daughter's favorite one was Starlight Angel. quote

Aww, I think that's understandable Star Light Angel would be her fave...it's got a little something for everyone, imo.

I think Nitro I discussed the out-of-order thing on my podcast ep about it, but it was shown out of order on TV to compensate for commercial breaks, and then in a SECOND different order on the VHS release to make it flow better.

I've been behind on watching stuff lately due to real world holiday kinda stuff, BUT Nitro I have still been really enjoying One Punch Man I think I mentioned that before, tho and Osomatsu-san, which is a pretty fun gag show to celebrate the anniversary of the artist who did Osomatsu-kun back in the day. Sadly, the 1st episode of the series--which was crazy hysterical--got removed due to all the parodies they slipped in there and I guess later they were afraid of being sued...it was so good, I'm sad they said it won't be released on DVD ever - -

I'm a couple of eps behind on Gundam Iron Blooded Orphans, but so far it's been alright. I'm mostly just enjoying having a Gundam simulcast, since we've never really gotten that before. I also got way behind on Ushio Tora, ahh I need to catch up!




Originally written by llj on 2015/11/30, 12:31:15 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

Future Diary, halfway through. Not exactly high art, but a hodgepodge of all things one historically associates with anime--violence, nudity, cuteness, incomprehensible plots, weird high-concept ideas, insane characters, and a nebbish protagonist. I've heard a lot of anime fans outright hate it, and for conventionally good reason, but it is sort of brilliant in a pulpy Everything-Including-The-Kitchen-Sink way. And it is in fact a pretty underrated black comedy. It wouldn't go down as anywhere near my most favorite thing I've ever seen, but it scratches an itch I've had for something that resembles the MD Geist era of anime OVAs. For most it's either So bad, So bad it's brilliant, or Crazy brilliant. I personally think it's a mix of 2 and 3 because I feel like it drops enough self-aware jokes about its own ridiculousness while still playing it all mostly straight, which is a pretty nice feat.




Originally written by greg on 2015/11/30, 22:08:43 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

I first heard of that Gundam Iron Blooded Orphans from a promotion in the latest JonTron video. I am scared of those orphans! I have no idea what it's about, but he has a funny way of saying things.

Last weekend I watched Be Forever Yamato. Wow, plenty of inspiration taken from War of the Worlds, with both the tripods from the book and the flying ships from the old movie.

The movie was a bit difficult to understand without subtitles, but I could get the gist of it. I wasn't expecting the character Sasha to be Starsha's daughter. Since this was a theatrical release, the visuals were rather impressive---especially that galaxy they visit where the phony Earth is. The movie got a bit sappy by the end, but it was still interesting to watch. I really, really want them to hurry up with more 2199 remakes of this series!




Originally written by Char Aznable on 2015/12/01, 01:53:29 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

One episode away from finishing The Seven Deadly Sins which is currently available for streaming on Netflix . It was one of those shows that really pulled me in. I knew nothing about the anime going in and now I'd be interested in checking out the manga. Highly recommended, even if it did take a few episodes to get me interested. But, after, I quickly became hooked. Elements of it remind me of early Dragon Ball Z, though I'm not entirely sure why.

quote llj Future Diary, halfway through. quote

I enjoyed Future Diary, though I did have a fair share of issues with it. The concept was fun and it definitely did have that 'pulp' feel. I wasn't much of a fan of the main character, but I did like Yuno Gasai and how they never hold back with how crazy she can be.




Originally written by llj on 2015/12/02, 12:13:58 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

quote Char Aznable

I enjoyed Future Diary, though I did have a fair share of issues with it. The concept was fun and it definitely did have that 'pulp' feel. I wasn't much of a fan of the main character, but I did like Yuno Gasai and how they never hold back with how crazy she can be. quote

I agree with all your points. I realize that from a marketing standpoint making your main character a bit bland gives it an insert your own face here factor, but I think we need to move beyond that more often, and have more main characters with distinctive personalities. It's always a risk when you give a main character an actual personality though, because distinctiveness is actually a turn-off for many people.

Another complaint I have with Future Diary is that the show may have worked a little better if you upped the age of the characters to their early 20s. In fact, I'm finding a lot of recent anime have been artistically handcuffed by marketing demands to keep their characters in their teens. Anohana is one of the biggest culprits of this. I just didn't BUY the story because all the characters just were a lot younger than a story like this should be. It would have been 100x more poignant if Anohana were a show about people in their 20s or 30ss. As a point of comparison, I finished reading Haruki Murakami's Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage recently, which had a very similar concept as Anohana, except in this novel it was about people in their late 30s. The passage of time and the changes in the characters hit a lot harder due to how old they had become.

My point is, age DOES make a difference. It's so painful to watch writers seem to want to write about people in their 20s or 30s being forced to adhere to the high school setting for marketing purposes. Future Diary almost went out of its way to have as few actual high school scenes as possible, which is revealing of how utterly disinterested it was in that setting and age group.

This is also a reason why Steins Gate was one of the more acclaimed shows in recent years. It was a story about 20 year olds with situations that were appropriate for people in their 20s.




Originally written by greg on 2015/12/05, 05:07:17 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

I watched the Yamato 2199 Ark of the Stars recently via a streaming site with subtitles. I saw this in the theater when it came out, and although I could understand what was going on more or less, seeing it subtitled helped me understand the dialogue more specifically. Fantastic movie. Some people online have said that they didn't care for it because it feels more like a Star Trek story, but that's why I like it.




Originally written by SteveH on 2015/12/05, 15:06:46 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

quote greg I watched the Yamato 2199 Ark of the Stars recently via a streaming site with subtitles. I saw this in the theater when it came out, and although I could understand what was going on more or less, seeing it subtitled helped me understand the dialogue more specifically. Fantastic movie. Some people online have said that they didn't care for it because it feels more like a Star Trek story, but that's why I like it. quote

It does share a theme with a couple of Star Trek The Next Generation stories, and even a classic Trek theme, kinda sorta, but there's that whole idea that there are really only like 8 stories conceptually worldwide, historically speaking, and everything tends to be some variation of that, so, foo on complainers.

What's really interesting to me is how Izubuchi et al are seriously mining Yamato lore and playing a very, VERY deep game. There's setup enough for 10 years of animation.

The one thing that worries me about the upcoming 'next Yamato project' is that they pull back and instead of keeping the Gatlantis people the 'space Mongol Horde' that we somewhat see in Stellar Ark, they decide to tone that down and make them green Klingons, with all that tacked on samurai stuff that evolved in ST TNG. I want my Comet Empire dudes to be raw and rough and nasty and brutish, we've got all the refined noble antagonists we need with the modern Gamilas. One thing we can probably count on, the female Gatlantis population will doubtlessly increase.




Originally written by greg on 2015/12/13, 22:06:12 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

I think the Gatlantians will continue in the tradition set forth in the Ark of Stars movie. I really can't wait for the next season of Yamato 2199 to begin. Hopefully it will be announced next year!

I recently saw an episode of Madoka Magica for the first time. I recorded episode 2 off of cable TV out of curiosity and watched it with my kid. She liked it, and I thought the unique visuals really makes the show unique. It was cool to see a magical girl summoning rifles out of thin air to shoot at a paper-like monster. That was pretty cool looking.




Originally written by usamimi on 2015/12/24, 07:07:05 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

quote greg I think the Gatlantians will continue in the tradition set forth in the Ark of Stars movie. I really can't wait for the next season of Yamato 2199 to begin. Hopefully it will be announced next year!

I recently saw an episode of Madoka Magica for the first time. I recorded episode 2 off of cable TV out of curiosity and watched it with my kid. She liked it, and I thought the unique visuals really makes the show unique. It was cool to see a magical girl summoning rifles out of thin air to shoot at a paper-like monster. That was pretty cool looking. quote

Madoka has a lot of really cool things going for it, visually. I didn't watch it until it'd been out for over a year, I think, because I wasn't a huge fan of the character designs, but I ended up really enjoying it! For...various reasons that I think would be a spoiler, so I won't say, lol. The series does get kinda violent later, though, just a head's up warning in case you might be worried for your daughter.

I FINALLY got around to seeing the 2 new Dragonball Z movies. Battle of the Gods was SUPER FUN, I enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I would. Super funny. Resurrection of F was good, but I think BotG was the strongest of the 2. Seeing Jaco was cool, though--and I was amazed to find out that Hikaru Midorikawa played Tien Shinhan in it?! I usually recognize Midorikawa's voice, but for this he sounded SO DIFFERENT! It really threw me off when I read that later.




Originally written by Kame-Sen'nin on 2015/12/24, 08:41:32 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

quote usamimi I FINALLY got around to seeing the 2 new Dragonball Z movies. Battle of the Gods was SUPER FUN, I enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I would. Super funny. Resurrection of F was good, but I think BotG was the strongest of the 2. Seeing Jaco was cool, though--and I was amazed to find out that Hikaru Midorikawa played Tien Shinhan in it?! I usually recognize Midorikawa's voice, but for this he sounded SO DIFFERENT! It really threw me off when I read that later. quote
I enjoyed both, but Battle of the Gods definitely felt like the stronger movie. I'd really like to see how they expand on everything in Dragon Ball Super...waiting to watch it is getting tougher by the day!




Originally written by SteveH on 2015/12/24, 11:33:58 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

One Punch Man rules and everything else drools. There, I said it.

Of course it's hype, but I GOT HYPE for the show. MAN that last episode!!!

I honestly cant say if I would want another season or if it should be left as-is to exist as a perfect moment of time.

And yet, I just have no interest in the manga! Funny, huh? Daryl Surat would be disappointed in me.




Originally written by Drew_Sutton on 2015/12/24, 12:42:15 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

The manga is an interesting beast, to me, in terms of its production history. It started online as a web-gag-comic really rough designs and layouts but similar if not identical premise. Shuueisha started publishing it in Shonen JUMP with better actually finished art for the weekly and continued to clean it up for the Tankouban collected releases. The manga looks great - I picked up the first volume about this time last year when I visited NYC. The anime is on my need to watch list hopefully, I can take some time over the holiday break like Saturday or Sunday and get through a few episodes. Sure if I am left alone long enough and I get into it enough that can turn into half the first season.

What time I've had the last couple of weeks though, I've been going through my Discotek DVDs I dropped a bunch of money on recently watched Dallos for the first time last weekend, today I am watching a couple more episodes of Orguss .

Dallos was really good! I liked the setting a lot and it was exceptionally well done, especially as it essentially-but-almost-by-accident pioneered the OAV boom. Some of Oshii's stuff is hard for me to digest but his early 80s stuff I find really enjoyable. The Discotek DVD has a special feature on it called Remembering Dallos or some such, which details a lot of the making of Dallos with Oshii and other production staff. Was surprised both at the release order being out-of-episode-order but also the fondness the team had for the action in episode 2, I started to get worried that episode 1 would be really dragged out and that it would lose focus on 3 and 4. Pleasantly surprised that wasn't the case at all! Really solid and tight all around. Really has a just-right feeling about it.




Originally written by llj on 2015/12/24, 15:31:18 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

Yeah, Dallos isn't as bad as its longtime rep suggests. It's certainly not perfect, as there are odd scene transitions one scene the protagonist is deciding whether to join the military and the next he's right in the middle of a battle and, if I recall correctly, the cliffhanger at episode 3 really jumps ahead a lot at the beginning of episode 4, and then only later you get the recap of what happened after the cliffhanger at episode 3. This might have been because of the weird release order though. It also has the none-too-subtle Gundam archetypes.

But the animation, especially the action scenes, are really quite well done and the ending really isn't as unsatisfactory as I had originally been led to believe. People say the ending feels more like the intro to a longer series, but for me it feels like the endings to a bunch of Oshii anime I've seen a lot of in his later work, where the protagonist is standing somewhere looking out at an uncertain future...




Originally written by usamimi on 2015/12/24, 17:46:51 PST :

Re: What are you Watching? :

It's so true! I know they seem to have animation....quality issues oh, Toei, what happened to you?! , so maybe Funimation's waiting until they redraw most of it for the BD release? But yeah, I feel ya. I felt like I was missing a lot in that second movie, even though it was still fun to watch.

I just got HULU with no commercials. I have been watching Daria, Beavis and Butthead, and Southpark. I really have been watching a LOT of Southpark. I just watched the episode where they parody Stanley Kubrick's "The Shining" It made me want to the Shining all over again. I want to watch Maru Penguindum, sorry I butchered the title so bad, by Ikuhara, the creator of Utena. I intend to get through some more Daria and Southpark Episodes tonight. Also, I have been watching Seinfield back to back this holiday. I tried to do the same with Married with Children, but the show is nothing but one insult after another. I wondered how I watched the show for so many years. I guess in small doses over a long period of time the show is not so bad.