Accel World

Accel World:  C

In the future, virtual reality and neural-integrated computers are as common as smartphones today, and there is a growing generation of children who have never been without them.  And now a new program is spreading, secretly, among such children: Brain Burst, a program that lets you accelerate yourself in time, allowing your mind to work at 1000 times the speed of an unenhanced human.  The creator of this miraculous software added an extra part to it: it's a fighting game, and you gain points by winning and lose them by losing and using the acceleration.  But what is the purpose of the game?  What is was the creators goal?  What experiment are they performing by making this power?  The answer can only be found by reaching 'Level 10' and defeating the greatest members of the game.

The story revolves around fat, short, game obsessed loser Haruyuki, who finds that the beautiful upperclassman who goes by 'Snow Black' is in awe of his AR skills and believes that he can be the one to learn the truth, and an awkward relationship blooms between them.  Haru, however, wonders if the only thing holding their relationship together is this game, and his concern is natural and human.

In short, the series starts out as a pretty interesting pre-transhuman romance set in a futuristic high school setting.  I was impressed, I wanted to know why this thing existed.  Was there some great lesson about growing through conflict?  Something to be learned through putting this gift on the line?  It had a lot of potential.

And it went and screwed it all up by devolving into a pointless parade of cheating villains, broken rules and video game superpowers for the entire second half of the series.  It came together for a decent finish, but the initial wonder of the concept and the transhumanism of the story are completely lost, as if it felt like it deserved a second season to wrap itself up.  Except at the pace it was going, it wouldn't have.

I can't be too harsh on the series, because the anime was based on a light novel series that's incomplete and in the process of being milked until it sucks, and I guess that's what you do with popular franchises, but it was still a really disappointing crash down around episode 13 as they struggled to make a villain last for the entire second half of the series.  It wasn't terrible, the characterization was good (I especially liked the character of Chiyuri, Haru's childhood friend, who managed some really heartrending moments during the later arcs), the animation was pretty, the story held together if you didn't engage your brain on how science and computers work.  But it was a disappointment, one of the biggest disappointments I've seen recently.

If you want a show with some good fights, pretty girls and interesting relationships, you could do worse than Accel World, but be sure you watch it knowing the second half kind of sucks.  I think if you know that it'll be fine, but like so many series, if you ask too much of it, it'll leave you very disappointed.

Rozen Maiden Zurückspulen

Rozen Maiden (2013):  C+

A third season which doesn't directly continue from the second season.  Overall it's a decent story if you're familiar with Rozen Maiden as a franchise but a weird one if you're not.  I personally felt a little shortchanged because I liked the villain and she didn't get a very satisfying ending, and the finale implying additional seasons based off this series' weird timeline.  But I guess with my warning you that's goign to happen you might not have the problem I did.

This story takes place in a parallel universe, except it also doesn't, because the parallel universe is sort of distantly connected to the original universe, and that connection is very important to the plot.  I found myself relating to the Unwound Jun much more than the Wound Jun in the original series, but overall this one was less slice-of-life comedy and more weirdly-paced drama with less payoff.  I did enjoy it and I felt it came together, but it wasn't as good as the high points of the original series, though it wasn't far below it, either.

If you want more Rozen Maiden and won't mind them screwing with pre-established events fromt he anime then knock yourself out, but if you either didn't like the original Rozen Maiden or don't know it, this isn't where you want to start.

Mondaiji-tachi ga Isekai kara Kuru Sou Desu yo

The Problem Children Seem to Have Come From Another World:  D+

I really want to say that if it weren't for the one problem with this series that it would be a C, but the more I think about it the more it's not true.

So Mondaiji is about three teenagers ('problem children') with truly ridiculous BS superpowers who get transported to a magical world where power is determined by victory in games and where you can wager anything from favors to lives to your very superpowers to the ownership of fantastic creatures to lifetimes of servitude.  They are met by a bunny-eared girl who explains the nature of the world and tries to get them to help her and her community, who have fallen on hard times.  Due to varying reasons, the problem children accept, and embark on a relatively disjointed journey to conquer the world.

That, on its own, is at least competent.  Not genius, but you could make something out of that that wasn't just sighingly bad.  And Mondaiji isn't offensively, facepalmingly, turn-it-off-ew bad, it's just completely lacking in particularly impressive qualities.

Of the three problem children, two are girls (the two on the left), and their powers are fairly clear: one has a supreme geas ability (it's implied though not demonstrated that with practice she'd be able to issue commands that the laws of physics would have to obey) and one can both talk to animals and receive the skills of animals she's befriended as gifts.  In practical terms she's a kung fu ninja with supersenses who can fly.  They both have personalities, flaws, are friendly if childish and troublesome and are set back at various times in the story.  Then there's the male problem child.  His superpower is classified 'Unknown' and appears to just be super-everything (but mostly speed and strength).  He is a jerk, he's a delinquent, he orders people around based entirely on the fact that they need him and he's just that good, and people, while they aren't totally happy with it, suck it up.  Even all that could be forgiven if he suffered a setback at some point, had to grow as a person, or needed help.  But unfortunately he's extraordinarily educated about even obscure topics and so he seems to know the answer to every major mystery (despite being a delinquent).  So he basically waltzes through the entire story undefeated and barely challenged.  Certainly never threatened.

Now, if the story were otherwise good and just had that, I could probably have given it a C, but the story is otherwise meh.  There's the occasional mythological reference, which is cool, but it all gets spelled out by Super Protagonist when he solves it needing only an occasional bright idea which someone else spouts out by accident, so it's not like my personal experience with mythology made me feel involved.

So what is good?  Um, the art's pretty good all around.  I liked the opening sequence.  And there's a great moment of meta-discussion of fan service and why panty shots are inelegant.  Seriously, that was the best moment in the series, when one of the characters explains how showing off underwear ruins the mystery, it's far better to make the viewer use their imagination.

So, if that's what you want to see, by all means watch Mondaiji-tachi.  Personally, I'd steer clear, though.

Houkago no Pleiades

Afterschool Pleiades:  A

This is a bit of a weird 'series'.  It's about 25 minutes long, in four 'episodes'.

It is excellent.  It is about the shortest magical girl story you could possibly have.  It has everything a magical girl anime needs: a transformation sequence, a cute mascot, a mysterious pretty boy, and a normal, clumsy girl who risks everything to protect her friends and try to tell him that he's not alone.

And it's good enough that it makes me tear up a little bit at the climax.

I love it, for being a story that is able to tell itself so quickly and so elegantly.  If you've ever wanted a reminder that you are not alone in the world, that someone else has seen what you've seen, take a half hour and watch Afterschool Pleiades.

Stella Girl's Academy High School Division C³ Club

Etc etc C³ Club: C+

So this is apparently what Gainax has been up to: a show about cute girls doing cute airsoft things.  While it falls into the trap of superpowered sports skill and AIRSOFT IS SERIOUS BUSINESS in a couple places, it's ultimately a show, much like Free!, about competition and the purpose of competitive activities, with a bit about personal development and finding a place thrown in.

Also lots of cute girls.  And guns.  Seriously, if you don't at least kind of want to buy an airsoft gun after this show something is probably wrong with you.

This show falls a little bit on the side of 'boobs' in the continuum of 'genius' to 'boobs' that makes up the shows that Gainax creates, and there's not a whole lot more to say about it than that it's another sports anime that manages a discussion of a deeper topic.  It doesn't come out as clearly about it as Free! did (and the final episode, which could have done so was instead just a fan service parade), so I have a tough time calling it 'good', but it's also definitely not bad.  It's not presumptive, it's not pretending to be deeper than it is.

So if you want to watch a bunch of cute girls shooting airsoft guns at each other and maybe getting a little serious about it in places, this show's fun.  But if that sounds kind of shallow or uninteresting then you can probably skip it and not feel like you're missing out.