Gundam SEED

Gundam SEED:  B

I was really hoping I could give it a B+, but the ending wound up falling a bit flat.  Overall, it was a very well-orchestrated military drama/romance, and about as anti-war as you can get when your protagonists are flying around in totally awesome giant robots.

I didn't really understand why the Earth Forces and ZAFT were fighting towards the end, I thought maybe they could learn to get along due to their mutual love of horrific war crimes.

Ultimately, the series loses quite a bit for a weak ending and some poor explanation in the middle, it really felt like they just didn't have enough time in the last episode to wrap everything up and explain it all, though there is a second series in the same universe, which I am intending to watch, so maybe that will bother to explain what the deal with the seeds is.

One thing that I was very pleased with for most of the series was how grey the morality was.  The good guys were good, but the bad guys weren't really that bad, it let us focus on the effect the war had on them as people, and the dehumanizing effects of loss and death.  This weakens as the series gets closer to the finale, both as a natural progression of characters getting over their issues and more blatantly evil characters filling the void as the former sympathetic villains start changing allegiances.  (Spoiler alert, Gundam pilots in a Gundam Series switch sides a lot...)

Overall:  If you need an introduction to the anime juggernaut that is Gundam, Gundam SEED is certainly not a bad way to go, and the first forty episodes are a well-crafted, emotionally-charged drama.  However, you may find the conclusion a little bit of a disappointment.

Gundam SEED 1-10

So one of my ongoing projects is designing a tabletop game system for playing magical girls and giant robots.  Yes, the same system, because the most interesting style of Magical Girl to me is Nanoha, and the magical girls in Nanoha are giant robots who happen to be wearing pretty dresses.  And Infinite Stratos, while the mecha part is awesome, it isn't really the focus of it, so I figured I'd get back to the real heart of the Real Robot genre, and that means Gundam or Macross.

My last contact with the Gundam franchises was Gundam Wing back in the late 90s, and I was generally unimpressed.  I'm told that's not an uncommon reaction to it: it's generally reviled as being lighter and softer in a weird way, and having an unreasonable amount of Ho Yay and Estrogen Brigade Bait.  But the mecha were cool and stuff blew up, so I watched it.

After a little research, I decided that trying to watch the original Mobile Suit Gundam, as I'd feel honor-bound to do if I were going to try to watch anything in the Universal Century timeline (the main Gundam franchise timeline, for the uninitiated).  The sheer volume of anime that would be committing to is presently beyond anything I can sanely say I want to start, so I tried to find another alternate universe like Wing to get my Gundam on in, and I stumbled across SEED.  Now quite an aged series (2002), it was described as being a very strongly mainstream Gundam series.  Jackpot.

I watched the first ten of fifty episodes tonight, and I'm enjoying it.  It's a military drama that uses robots ace pilots as its main protagonists and antagonists, and is already dealing with fantastic racism in the form of genetically engineered humans, and isn't hesitating to lather the gray on the gray reality of how war sucks for everyone involved.

Being a long series, it's got some uphill to go before I give it a truly good rating, simply because it needs to convince me that it needed 50 episodes to tell this story, but so far I'm willing to believe that it'll manage a B.  50 episodes does let the series allow for a lot of growth, however, and means that there will be enough time to recognize the entire (already fairly substantial) cast.

First Impressions:  Series military drama is serious.  Stay away if you want laughs or light-hearted, hot-blooded robot battles.

All Purpose Cultural Cat Girl Nuku Nuku (OVA)

All Purpose Cultural Cat Girl Nuku Nuku (OVA):  C+

This one's tough to describe and may earn me some hate from people who grew up with it.

Nuku Nuku is a classic, combining a lot of elements into a fairly original work.  I certainly do not think it is bad, by any stretch of the imagination, but it was the sort of series I watched because I knew the name and I felt out of place not knowing much more about it.

Turns out there's not much to know.  A lighthearted romp of a 6-episode OVA fraught with explosions, fan service and conflict involving a broken family (played for laughs, as the father is a modern mad scientist and the mother is a high-rolling executive bound to have her son back no matter the cost in high-tech machinery).

I was a little disappointed in the very-human portrayal of Nuku Nuku, who is supposedly a cat brain in an android body, but mostly acts like the modern stereotypical cat girl (though notably lacking ears).  The conflicts, however, are well-justified and orchestrated, despite the comedy, you really can appreciate the "villainous" mother's desire to be with her son.

I should note that I only watched the OVA, not the TV anime or the second OVA (Nuku Nuku Dash), because my sources informed me that the original was the best.

Enjoyable and classic, but ultimately forgettable.

Infinite Stratos: Final

Infinite Stratos:  C++

Pretty much everything good about the series right here.

Right, so I spent my sunday rewatching IS, and I've concluded that overall, the series does not quite deserve a B. It has a fair number of truly brilliant moments, a good ending, and I do like the series, but my critic's mind tells me that it doesn't deserve to be in the same category as a shows of genuinely higher quality.

IS belongs in a special "Guilty Pleasure" box for me: It's fun, it's funny, it's pretty to look at, but it's lacking in depth, emotion, meaning or comedy that I really want from a series that I would give a higher rating to.  It's a little all over the place (which is to be expected from a series whose mission statement is "harem/mecha"), and jumps between unwanted harem humor and real robot drama, doing an only okay job of each.

All that being said, I would watch a second season, especially if they didn't go overboard with introducing new characters and just developed Ichika, the five girls, Chifuyu and Tabane.  And maybe Pika-tan.

Star Driver

Star Driver - Kagayaki no Takuto:  B++

"Revolutionary Girl Utena with Giant Robots."

The only thing keeping Star Driver from being an A is that it borrows a little too much from it's pink-haired big sister.  However, it is a lovely story of romance, intrigue and heroism with deep, human characterization and profound mythic feel, though it generally avoids direct references to mythology.

Visually stunning and with a beautiful soundtrack (especially the North Maiden's song), Star Driver is an excellent example of modern Seinen: thoughtful, meaningful and active.

Infinite Stratos

So, the last episode of Infinite Stratos came out last week, and I was lazy and haven't finished the series until tonight.

You're probably wondering how I'm going to grade it.  Honestly, I am too.  It's between a C+ and a B.

I was all set to give it a C+ before the last two episodes, because Episodes 9 and 10 are pretty meh, but they really do manage to bring the ending around, though it's the kinda sappy thing you'd expect.

So, I'm withholding judgment for a little while.  When I have the time I'll watch it all in one sitting and give a final score.  Because as much as it's not good, it is fun, and fun is worth about half a letter to me.

Short version: If harem anime isn't your thing, stay away.  But if the idea of watching a series where the protagonist is not only a chick magnet, but totally emotionally oblivious and quite possibly gay (it's not canon, but it's a reasonable accusation), plus some entertaining flying around in power armor with explosions and pretty girls in swimsuits, then go for it.

Hell Girl Season 1 (Final)

Jigoku Shoujo Season 1:  B

I have been jokingly telling my friends "I've been watching Hell Girl.  It's the exact opposite of Hellboy.  Hellboy is action, nazis, violence, dragons and robots.  Hell Girl is horror, psychology, revenge, hate and pathos."

Like a lot of things I have to say about Jigoku Shoujo, I'm not *quite* criticizing it.  I liked it. It was enjoyable and interesting.  B means "good."

But.

It was slow.  Now, I watch anime at breakneck pace, I'll often get through 10+ episodes in a single night, more than that on weekends.  Jigoku Shoujo demanded to be taken slower.  It was written to be watched as it aired, one episode per week over the course of six months.  The mystery percolates well, we find out about Ai and the nature of the Hell Correspondence (Hell Hotline in other translations, but I think that sounds dumb) very slowly, and the show does not bother with fast action.  It's a brooding sort of conflict, very much in the way of Japanese Horror, the horror is not about the threat of imminent death, it's about the wrongness of the world, and how that wrongness might just swallow you.

The story doesn't surprise you with plot twists, but it clearly isn't trying to surprise you, the degree of formula used makes that clear.  Rather than surprise you, it makes you wonder if this will be the time that things end differently, like any series with a formula, you wonder if this will be the time when the formula breaks down, because it has to eventually.

And all the while there's a degree of wish fulfillment going on: Bad people are being punished in horrible ways.  Yes, people had to suffer to justify the punishment, but we are seeing something like justice done, and a certain part of us appreciates that.

Jigoku Shoujo speaks to a strange, somewhat unwanted part of the viewer's desires, and explores that part.  Is revenge ever justified?  Is one who enables revenge doing good?  Doing evil?  Should humanity be able to take into their own hands what is not in their hands?  The series does not provide a moral or an answer, simply a resolution.  As Enma Ai says as the final lines of the series,

"The rest is up for you to decide."

Hell Girl (Again)

So, after a bit of random investigation, I learned that due to a titling error in the copy I got had me watch the last episode of the first season first.

While I haven't finished the first season yet, the change in perspective brought by seeing the last episode first definitely changes the way the series is veiwed.  Not necessarily in a bad way, but it's definitely influenced my opinions of it to the extent that I'm probably not going to be able to provide a coherent description of it until I've watched the entire thing, and I may need to rewatch a few episodes at that point.

The entire thing has made me wonder what it's like trying to tell a story to which the viewer knows the punchline, though, perhaps, not the joke, and the literary inventiveness in this particular sort of project.  It is essentially the way I'm seeing this, I know the punchline but I only have the vaguest outline of the joke.

But, I am still interested in finding out how it all comes together.

Hell Girl (Season 1) 1-7

So a little while back a friend of mine posted a viral meme on Facebook saying "Post 15 anime series in 15 minutes and share it with 15 friends."  I freakin' hate viral memes, but this was harmless and had the potential to be interesting.  Most of the series that I found on the list I'd seen, most of the others I'd heard of, and among the ones I'd heard of was Hell Girl, which I will hereafter refer to by its title in Japanese: Jigoku Shoujo, for reasons that I will go into.  Some weeks ago it was mentioned, and while I had heard the name in passing I knew absolutely nothing about it.  Tonight I decided to find out.

First of all, the title.  I'm going to deal with the words backwards: "Shoujo" means "girl," though in Japanese the word also covers teenage girls without requiring the additional descriptor that English does.  "Jigoku" is a word for the Japanese underworld, the place where the souls of evil humans go upon death.  This does sound an awful lot like the western concept of Hell, and, indeed, I have no issue with the translation being "Hell Girl,"  my issue is with the difference in terminology and the implications it causes.  However, the greatest difference between the western Hell and Jigoku is the presence of the demonic: Jigoku is more like a very unpleasant Purgatory before souls are reincarnated, it is a land of death and suffering, but by its nature rather than at the hands of malicious entities.  "Hell Girl" implies, to the English-speakers ear, that the eponymous character is a demon, maybe even a succubus or some other such entity, where nothing could be further from the truth.  It is a small complaint,

It took me two episodes to finally classify Jigoku Shoujo is "supernatural horror".  When I realized that I was watching horror, I also realized the things that go bump in the night, the ones who drag humans into living nightmares and carry them off to an  existence of eternal suffering are our protagonists.

Given that, it shouldn't be a surprise that Jigoku Shoujo is a very dark series.  We are treated to witnessing the monsters among humanity through the eyes of their victims, who are unable to see these monsters punished by mortal man.  These otherwise powerless individuals are given a way out: a website exists that is only accessible at midnight.  Entering the name of the one they are unable to forgive there summons Enma Ai, our protagonist, the Jigoku Shoujo.  She presents the wronged party with a black straw doll with a red string around its neck, and explains the terms.  By removing the string, a contract is formed, and the one who was named will be taken to Jigoku.  However, there is a steep price: the summoner, too, will wind up in Jigoku upon their death, with no chance of going to heaven.  Ai is often kind enough to present her summoners with a view of what their existence in Jigoku will be like.

Despite its relatively formulaic nature and the fact that it introduces characters (and takes them to Jigoku) at a truly prodigious rate, the differences in situations and in characterization, as well as the slowly-unfolding understanding of Ai and her assistants that we get through watching them work makes each episode new and interesting for what small hints can be gleaned about the returning cast and whatever metaplot there may be.

The art is a relatively realistic style, and indeed the first thing I thought upon seeing it was "It looks like Serial Experiments Lain," another series which doesn't look like anime (or rather, doesn't look like what we've come to think of as anime.)  While it is horror, it is relatively light on gore and nightmare fuel, though the brief periods where the sinners are given time to confess their sins can be extremely creepy and terrifying, especially if you let yourself empathize with the circumstances.

Special mention also goes to Enma Ai's voice actress Mamiko Noto, (I know her as Hecate from Shakugan no Shana) whose delivery wonderful creepy ethereal quality which I never get tired of listening to.

What I've seen of it so far is not mind-blowing but is a very good and relatively placid horror story.  I'll post a further review when I've seen the entire first season.

Royal Space Force: The Wings of Honneamise

Whug, long week, and I spent a lot of it on Hayate (the Second Season is so different from the first...) and watching an episode here and there of series I don't want to fully review.

But I've had this movie sitting in my "Unwatched" folder for a month or two now so I figured it was time to finally watch the first piece of work Studio Gainax made under the name Studio Gainax.

Royal Space Force: The Wings of Honneamise:  B

First impressions were meh.  The pacing is pretty slow, it's a grown up movie, the kind my parents would like.  It reminded me of The Right Stuff, which I saw when I was like 11 and didn't really know how to take, this is back when I wanted to be an astronaut, like all kids did, before I realized how much kinda boring work it is.

But as I kept watching it, it grew on me.  The main character, Shirotsugu, is a soldier in the eponymous Royal Space Force, which, much like our own modern space program, has fallen on hard times, unlike our space program, this one has not yet gotten off the ground, hearkening back to the days of rocketry and launch pad explosions.  As the story progresses, Shirotsugu finds religion (odd for a Japanese movie), struggles with his own identity and humanity, fights back against the apathy infesting the space force and the political intrigues surrounding the planet's first manned space mission.

It is a very mature piece, that I felt like I got right away and hit the nail on, very much about adult emotions finding one's place, not only a man's place in life, but humanity's place in the universe, and if it can hold your interest, it's a very touching story.

The animation style is jarring, compared to the beautiful people we are so used to seeing in modern anime, the characters have a rough and almost ugly look to them, but the old, plainly hand-drawn cells have an expressive quality of shading which one doesn't see often outside of Studio Ghibli's work (and if it reminds you of a Ghibli production visually, it should, most of the animators worked at Studio Ghibli before working at Gainax).

Overall, if you can get into a very human, political story, it's an excellent movie, but if you're looking for a couple hours of action-packed explosions and fan service, look elsewhere.