First Impressions: Mayo Chiki

Plot Synopsis: Konoe Subaru, 17, has been serving as the butler of Suzutsuki Kanade in school, a classmate of Sakamachi Kinjirou. Due to an accident, Sakamachi discovers Subaru's secret... that he's actually a girl!? Apparently she will be removed from her position if anyone at school finds out. What will unfold from this chain of events?

Before viewing: I think everyone has that one genre that's a guilty pleasure for them, one that they always enjoy even when they know it's stupid. For me, it's gender bender. I've always been a fan of gender bender, even when I can't defend the series as being good. They always entertain me, so it's very likely I'll enjoy this series.

After viewing: This is such a standard gender bender series that you can almost see every moment happen before it does. Pretty much the only difference between this and other gender benders is that unlike most shonen gender benders, it's a girl rather than a boy who's gender-bending. It's a cliche ridden series, and the logic is so ridiculous it's laughable. But if you enjoy these cliches as much as I do, it's just as entertaining as any other gender bender series, but it's certainly not the best, and definitely can't be considered good. It's just average.

First Impressions: R-15

Plot Synopsis: (from MAL)Akutagawa Taketo is a teenage porn novel writer. He enters Hirameki Gakuen, which accepts only geniuses with outstanding talent. He leads his classmates with his porn skills to win the interclass competition.

Before viewing: Oh man...I am not looking forward to this one. Just look at that synopsis. Porn skills? Really? What school would possibly allow someone in their school on the basis alone of being a porn writer? Nobody considers writing porn a work of genius! What kind of school is this anyways? And how is writing porn going to help his class win the interclass competition? And what does the title mean anyways? I'm expecting that none of these questions will be answered adequately.

After viewing:Well...yeah. It's exactly what you'd think it would be. And yes, none of my questions were answered in this episode. It's utterly ludicrous that this character is so infamous as a porn writer that he ended up in a school for "geniuses", (which is really just a school for people that have some talent in a field, how talented is hard to say), even though he writes under a pen name. How does everyone know already?

The main character Taketo is a very deluded one. He's a little smug about the fact that he writes porn novels, scoffing at people who are offended by them and considers himself to be a true visionary, an avante-garde writer for writing about "taboo" topics. He's hardly the first person to write pornography, and the exerts from his porn novels the series randomly throws in shows that he's not a very creative person; his scenarios are so generic, they're hardly worth being made into a porno, let alone ending up in history books and winning literary awards as he imagines himself doing. In other words, there is no reason for him to be at this school, because he's can't be considered a "porn genius".

There are several characters introduced, some with only a screencard telling us some information about them before disappearing immediately. The only characters besides the main one that gets any screentime are a photographer named Raika, Ritsu, a gay math genius, Fukune, a shy clarinet player that the opening makes clear is the love interest, and The Newspaper Chief, AKA Walking Cleavage Dominatrix character. There are way too many characters to keep track of, and not enough screentime for anyone to really get to know any of them. Taketo's homoerotic relationship with his gay friend is pretty cute though, and Ritsu quickly comes to his defense if he's being insulted. In fact, with Taketo getting flustered when Ritsu's face is really close to his, and his out of nowhere "I like you", I'm pretty convinced that Taketo is bisexual. I also find interesting that the only girl in the series Taketo doesn't sexualize is the girl he actually likes.

The biggest problem with the series is that it should be an actual porno. It's constant censorship of sex scenes ends up with the screen being almost completely covered with the censor. The series is halfway between being a fanservice series and an actual porno, and as a result, it's not really a series for anyone. If you're looking for something erotic, this series will just frustrate you because it's so censored. Otherwise, it has way too pornographic scenes to appeal to anyone else.

A ridiculous premise, with a main character with no reason to be in this school, and too much censorship to make this series appeal to the kind of people that like this type of show, makes this series a bit of a dud.

First Impressions BLOOD-C

Plot Synopsis:(from MAL)Ukishima Shrine is located in an old, picturesque lakeside town. Shrine maiden Kisaragi Saya lives there along with her father, Tadayoshi. By day, she lives the life of a normal high school student at Sanbara Academy. By night, she hunts the Old Ones. Possessing supernatural physical prowess, the Old Ones prey on humans, and only Saya has the ability to defeat them.

Thoughts after viewing: What exactly the connection between this series and the Blood+ series or the movie is I'm not entirely sure, but I haven't seen either of those, so I'm seeing this series without any knowledge of the related series.

This was a pretty slow episode. Nothing particularly interesting happens until the last ten minutes of the episode, and the first fourteen minutes is spent introducing the characters and rather lazily giving exposition (Why don't Saya's friends already know this information about her?) The imagery from the opening and what little I did know of the Blood series suggested to me that this would be a fairly dark series, so I spent this part of the episode anxiously waiting for something interesting to happen.

Once you do get to the end of the episode, it becomes worth it though. The last ten minutes of the episode is a fight scene, and it's pretty awesome. The coolest part of this fight scene is how Saya responds to combat. She is a complete badass, which is unexpected because she spent the rest of the episode being so cute, sweet and klutzy. Okay yeah, it makes no sense for her to be clumsy except when she fights, but it's still cool.

There is absolutely no dialogue in the fight scene, just ten minutes of kicking ass. Saya doesn't whine or say annoying catchphrases to the audience, no unnecessary explanation of everything she is going to do. She's known that this would happen her entire life, so she's prepared and knows what she has to do. She just silently stares off with the monster and kills it as quickly and efficiently as possible. It's seriously cool.  

The character designs are by CLAMP, and the series is visually similar to xxxHolic. As expected, the character designs are very attractive, while managing not to make everyone look exactly the same. Saya's hair does bother me a little bit, it doesn't seem to move naturally, but I'm just nitpicking. The animation itself is fluid, and pretty well done. The opening theme is a fairly generic J rock song, and the background music is pretty good, but oddly creepy at unnecessary parts, like when Saya is walking down the stairs and this creepy piano music is playing. I thought something was going to jump out at her, but the next scene is her going ga-ga over a puppy she found.

If they make the fight scenes longer, and spend less time on boring scenes like Saya being late for school, this will be a pretty entertaining show. Hopefully it's just because this is the first episode and they wanted to give us as much backstory as possible before kicking things into high gear. There still is a lot of things that need to be explained, such as the creatures is fighting, and the nature of her and her father's powers, but I expect that in the next episode I'll get more explanation for the interesting details of the show and less about the more dull ones.

First Impressions: Nyanpire the Animation

Plot Synopsis: It's about a cat, who's turned into a vampire and lives with a girl named Misaki.

Before viewing: I still think it's really weird that, out of any show Gonzo could make after disappearing for two years, they went with this one. A short (four minutes per episode) series about vampire cats. It's just so...meh. It doesn't look interesting at all. Let's see...

After viewing: That was... mildly annoying. What does it mean when the latest series you release is something so bland and inane?  In many cases, it usually spells the end of something. Will Gonzo be focusing on releasing series like this until they sputter out of existence? This comes from the company behind Afro Samurai, Full Metal Panic!, Gantz, fricking Hellsing! This series is so out of character for them, it would be like a Disney Channel Original series featuring constant blood, guts and sexuality!

On to the actual show, there isn't really a lot to talk about. It's four minutes of a cat whining about how much it wants blood. First of all, I am sick and tired of vampires constantly whining about how hungry they are. You're fucking immortal! You have powers beyond our wildest dreams! Surely you can be hungry for a little while, and surely you can keep your self control in check. It's seriously getting annoying. Secondly, it's just as annoying when the main character throws a temper tantrum because its owner hasn't made its dinner yet. No one's going to like a character who can't wait two freaking minutes to eat! It's not cute; it's just obnoxious. There's not much else to say, aside from the fact that the animation looks like Hot Topic vomited all over a cotton candy machine.

Oh yes...the ending theme. The ending theme is in live action, with a J-pop idol in gothic lolita lipsyncing to a song while maids and plushies of the characters prance around her. It's...weird. And extremely annoying

In short, bland show, annoying whiny main character, and annoying ending theme. Not much to enjoy, just that it's mercifully short.

Ikoku Meiro no Croisee

Plot Summary: It's a series taking place in the mid-1800s about a Japanese girl named Yune who moves in Paris and works as an attendant in an ironwork shop with a man named Oscar and his nephew Claude.

Before Viewing: So far this season I've been utterly bored by Double J and Ro Kyu Bu!, mildly entertained by Uta no Prince-sama, and loved Kamisama no Memochou. Here's another series that I was really looking forward to. First of all, I love historical series. I'm a bit of a history geek, so these types of series always peak my interest. Secondly, I'm very interested in culture, so series where the characters get to experience culture shock interest me as well. And finally, look at those beautiful costumes! I am such a sucker for lovely settings and costumes, and this series appears to have both. This series better be pretty great!

After viewing: With beautiful animation, scenery, music and a very adorable lead, this series hits all the right buttons for me. This is moe at its finest, the way it’s supposed to be. No panty shots or objectifying the adorable lead, just a sweet little girl trying her hardest to accomplish something. The series has a very classy feel, although the accordion music in the background is a little much. You’d think people just constantly walk around carrying accordions in France. Yune is almost unbearably cheerful, completely unfazed by moving halfway around the world, and is delighted rather than confused or upset by culture shock. She never whines, even through internal monologue, which is rather refreshing for these fish out of water series, even though it is a bit unrealistic. The only time she ever gets upset is when she accidently breaks something in the shop, to which she responds by selling her most precious possession, given to her by her mother that she’ll most likely never see again, without even a second thought.

This episode is more about atmosphere than story-telling, and it’s a very relaxing enjoyable one. It’s the kind of series that you would watch at the end of a stressful day and feel immediately calm and serene. It’s almost like sight-seeing in an era that you’ll never get a chance to see, so much detail is put into the sights, the art, the scenery. It’s just simply lovely in every way.

The series seem to revolve around Claude and Yune attempting to understand each other’s culture, which is a nice set up. Claude is a bit of a tsundere character, but he’s the type that’s nice to those he knows or intends to know well. At first, he’s irritated that his uncle brought home a little girl to work in their metalworking shop, and he’s a bit culturally insensitive, but by the end of the episode he acknowledges this and apologizes in a Japanese way to Yune, promising to learn more about her culture. He also swears to her that he’ll one day buy back her mother’s kimono, which is very expensive and precious to Yune and very sweet of him to do.

One problem the series does have is that it attempts to acknowledge the language barrier in a very confusing way. Most of the time, in television, books or movies, everyone speaks the language of the audience, and no language barrier is acknowledged, even between characters from different nationalities. This series attempts to acknowledge that the characters are speaking different languages, but they are all actually speaking Japanese. With characters that speak both French and Japanese, it’s impossible to tell if they’re supposedly speaking French or Japanese, and it’s confusing. Sometimes the characters supposedly don’t understand one another, but you can’t tell because they’re speaking the same language. And then the series retcons that and they can have a conversation with one another. Who can speak Japanese, and who speaks French in the series? It’s extremely confusing, and not very well explained or conveyed. This could work in written format, which the series was originally a light novel series, but it doesn’t work in an animated one.

Overall, despite unrealistic characters, a badly conveyed language barrier, and a little too much reliance on French stereotypes, it is a lovely piece of animation, and one that I was glad to have experienced and spent time on.

First Impressions:Ro-Kyu-Bu!

Ro Kyu Bu is the story of Hasegawa Subaru, a high schooler whose basketball club gets disbanded after the club president falls for the eleven year old daughter of the team advisor. He becomes the coach of a elementary girl basketball team. And...teaches them basketball.

Ro Kyu Bu is another anime that has absolutely nothing that stands out about it. The problem with seeing as everything that's coming out is that you get to see a lot of bland crap, and this is one of those shows. The only thing interesting about it is the confusion the creator obviously has about what elementary school girls do in the locker room to one another, and all I can say about that is that he needs some therapy or something.

The characters are such cardboard cutouts that there's no point in figuring out who's who. There's basketball girl, pigtailed pervert, big boobs girl, glasses girl, and tiny-mildy-eccentric girl. The lead is yet another cipher character, and his aunt, the advisor for the elementary girls basketball team, is another much older character who looks thirty years younger character. Nobody is interesting, and I can't tell who's who because they all look exactly the same except for hair color.

It's not a good sign when you're first introduced to the characters, they're in maid outfits. In an anime supposedly about basketball, they're dressed like maids. It's also not a good sign when while in the locker room, the sixth grader with DD boobs is felt up by the rest of the girls. Hey, at least she wears a sports bra while practicing, because her breasts are only noticeable outside of practice.

Yet another entry in the genre of "young girls being cute while doing _______ and behaving in sexual ways" that doesn't stand out in any way possible. I'll probably watch another new anime tomorrow, can it please be one that's actually interesting?

Cars 2

As far as animation companies go, Pixar is possibly the most highly acclaimed. Their films are unique, well written and true examples of films for all ages. At its best, Pixar is sublime and meaningful, with powerful messages, beautiful and inspiring animation, and great casts of characters. At its worst, it's still entertaining and fun, with great animation with likeable characters. If that's the worst you can do, it's still pretty impressive.

Admittingly, I was disappointed when I heard that they were making a new Cars film. Pixar has only made sequels to one film of theirs, while it seemed like every single other studio was milking their franchises for all they were worth. I didn't want to see Pixar join in. I'm sick to death of sequels and adaptations. I want to see original films. However, with a Monsters Inc sequel in the makings, and even a possible Toy Story 4, it appears that Pixar is joining in the parade of endless sequels. And it's a real shame. Pixar has made it clear that you don't need to constantly make sequels to make money.

Let's be honest here, Cars 2 is not the greatest film ever made by Pixar. Not even close. That doesn't mean it's a bad film though. The idea of a world entirely inhabited by cars and other vehicles is ridiculous, and raises some horrifying questions if you think too much about it, questions that are never addressed of course. Absolutely nothing would change if the characters were humans rather than cars. It’s made even more ridiculous when international politics and espionage is introduced into the mix. It is a good marketing ploy though, and it’s hard to deny that Cars has made a bunch of money through merchandising, possibly only topped by Toy Story. In terms of making money, Cars 2 was a good idea. Of course, if there’s anything reviewers and critics hate, its obvious ploys to make money. Because, you know, people shouldn’t try to make money out of movies, especially when they do it for a living. And that’s what Cars 2 feels like.

Out of all the obvious ploys to make money however, Cars 2 is probably one of the most enjoyable. Yeah, it’s not the most intelligent movie out there, but it knows that. It’s not trying to be. It’s an affectionate parody of spy films, and you really get the feel that everyone involved was having fun making the film. The villains are at their hammiest, overplaying the stereotypical villains, and the British agents are every secret agent stereotype imaginable, down to the ridiculous array of hidden weapons and technology decades ahead of its time. I can imagine how they came up with this movie:
“So let’s make a second Cars movie. It’ll make a lot of money. In fact, we already know it’ll be a box office hit, so let’s do whatever the hell we want. What do you guys wanna do?”
“Well, I loved James Bond when I was a kid, let’s make something like that.”
“Dude, James Bond is freaking rad! Do it!”
It really does feel like everyone involved is just having a blast, and when everyone involved is obviously having so much fun, it’s hard not to enjoy it along with them.

The greatest thing about this movie is definitely the animation. One of the greatest strengths of the original Cars was how beautifully they depicted the American Southwest, and this sequel takes it beyond that. The international setting allows the animators to pull out all the stops, and the backgrounds are lush and gorgeous, filled not only with famous landmarks, and lovely details. Porto Cosso is a beautiful depiction of the Italian countryside, with its crumbling buildings and their architectural details, and probably the loveliest setting of the film. Japan is a dizzyingly crowded and bright, full of neon lights, posters with big eyed cars, saturated in technology but with a tinge of the traditional, with the kabuki theater and geisha girls. Buckingham Palace is beautifully rendered, and the brief time spent in the Radiator Springs and France is lovely as well. The background is endlessly great to look at, beautiful and even breathtaking.

It may be one of the weakest of Pixar films, but it’s still a great film. The backgrounds are filled with eye candy for anyone who loves rural settings, ancient architecture, urban landmarks and futuristic modern architecture. It’s apparent that despite being a money making ploy, everyone involved really did put effort into it, and enjoyed every minute of working on the film. And that kind of obvious effort and enjoyment is hard not to respect or like. It’s a great ride, and a fun film that is worth the time.