An American Writer's Thoughts on Japanese Animation

Xtinction Prophecy – X Spoiler Review

So, as long-time readers will know, I’m a fan of silly theme months. This September, we’re going back to primary school by learning our ABCs… featuring a selection of shows with what could be taken as one-letter titles. First up is X, the letter everybody thinks is the coolest until they grow out of it. Or rather, the 2001 Shoujo apocalypse-themed urban fantasy battle anime that couldn’t even be bothered with a subtitle. Sometimes it gets called X/1999, but we’ll forgive that.

The genre mix up there – particularly the Shoujo demographic – may sound awkward, but this is based on a CLAMP manga, so I actually have decently high expectations going in.

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Based on a Taira Story – The Heike Story Spoiler Review

The Taira Clan is an interesting part of Japanese history. I imagine there’s a fair set of Westerners who have heard of them who have done so through a love of Japanese spooks and thus the infamous Taira no Masakado. But, there’s history behind the ghost story, itself both widely reported and significantly mythologized, mostly do do with the eventual conflict between the Taira and their rivals, the Minamoto.

The two clans are also known as the Heike (Taira) and Genji (Minamoto), and their clash, the Genpei War, did a lot of heavy lifting to shape the history of Japan. Though the Minamoto were the ultimate victors, The Tale of Heike is one of the most famed (and period) literary accounts of the war. The Heike Story promises to provide a take on the aged epic.

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Anime Film Club: Biorobotics 110 – Make a Girl Spoiler Review

Robot romances are a kind of interesting little genre, aren’t they? At least to me, it’s somewhat fascinating that there’s this very specific cluster of tropes surrounding a very particular relationship between humans and technology, yet somehow still a lot of good variation.

In different ways, to different degrees, I’ve covered this kind of material in Planetarian, Time of Eve, Dusk Beyond the End of the World, Armitage III, the classic Chobits, and – my personal favorite of the selection I’ve reviewed – Beatless. Haruhi as my witness, that’s not even a comprehensive list of all the ones I’ve reviewed that could count. There’s just something about boy meets mechanical girl that seems to have struck enough of a chord for repetition, iteration, and frankly a few pretty good shows.

Make a Girl, however, might be the most straightforward execution of the topic. Or, at least, that’s the pitch.

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Don’t Make a Deal with the Schoolgirl Devil – Engage Kiss Spoiler Review

When I read the pitch for Engage Kiss, I felt something nagging at me. It promised to be a supernatural urban fantasy battle anime, with the oddly-overused “unique” setting of a mega-float city in the Pacific, with a solid love polygon theme, skewing Harem of course. Seems harmless enough, so why is there creeping dread running down my spine?

… If anyone says “This is our fight” at a climax as their big line, I’m going to crack.

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Multiverse of Melancholy – Sonny Boy Spoiler Review

You know what, no intro this time. The show doesn’t give us one, why should I?

We begin with a school having already been transported. Where? Kind of nowhere. That is to say, absolutely nowhere, a black void that surrounds it and that has bestowed supernatural powers on some of the thirty-some students. We meet quite a few of these folks in short order: lackadaisical boy Nagara and offbeat girl Nozomi seem to be our leads, more or less doing their own thing while everyone else tries to invoke or avoid a Lord of the Flies scenario.

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I Got Pig Iron – The Sacred Blacksmith Spoiler Review

The Sacred Blacksmith is a show that makes a lot of promises. It’s going to be a fantasy in an original setting, not a total knockoff. It’s not going to be about the strongest with an unstoppable cheat power. It’s going to deliver some serious material, since it’s got a more mature rating.

In at least some sense, this show keeps its promises. However, while some of them are welcome breaths of fresh air, none of them equate to quality. I’ve learned all too well in my time as a reviewer that only quality equals quality, so it’s time to determine whether The Sacred Blacksmith’s work is one for the museums, or for the recycling center.

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Seasonal Selection – Sparks of Tomorrow Episode 1-3

So, due to circumstances beyond my control, it’s likely that this whole summer season will be updated in a sporadic manner. Hopefully, this won’t effect regular Monday reviews, but expect the Sparks of Tomorrow entries to come in odd clumps.

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Is It Still Paranoid When There Is Something Out To Get You? – Paranoia Agent Spoiler Review

This show is a tough one to summarize – it’s told very much like Boogiepop Phantom. That is to say, each episode tells both its own story and part of a greater hole, which are linked by tangents. At least this time around the show tends to move forward in time episode over episode. This does, however, mean that there are loads and loads of characters that bring loads and loads of plots.

The first episode concerns Tsukiko Sagi, a character designer in something of a slump after producing a mega hit. One night, on her way home from work, she becomes the first victim of the mysterious assailant that comes to be known as Shounen Bat.

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