I’ve had my dose of “misfortunate” anime that are all the rage nowadays; Madoka Magica, Gakkou Gurashi and Yuuki Yuuna to name a few. These shows are brutal in their own right but at least mercifully gives you some time to take a quick breather from all the anguish before shoving it all back down in your throat again twenty seconds later. Magical Girl Raising Project (Mahoiku from here on) is kind of like that but without the generous timeouts.
While going through the usual process of watching a tonne of anime at the start of a new season and then narrowing down my selection to a select few I’m interested in, Shigatsu wa Kimi no Uso for some unknown reason was kept out of my radar back in Autumn last year. It was only until April (funnily enough) that my friend from university recommended it to me and I accidentally the entire forty-four chapter manga. I was hooked. It -that- good. Shigatsu is the first series in such a long time that has kept me this hooked and eager to find out what happens in the next chapter. As a result, this review is aimed at the series as a whole, while comparing the differences between the anime and manga.
After an abysmal year in 2014 in terms of post entries due to university and related, in an attempt to write more in 2015 I’ll aim to write at least one blog post every month this year. So for my first article of the year I’m going to review a sweet and innocent romantic comedy manga that I’ve been reading that recently finished; Bocchi na Bokura no Renai Jijou!
Nerawareta Gakuen (Psychic School Wars) was originally a 1973 science fiction novel by Taku Mayumura, which spawned a bunch of live action dramas, films, but most recently an anime film by Ryousuke Nakamura over at the lively bunch at Sunrise studios.
Don’t get the name of the movie fool you however since Nerawareta Gakuen is anything more than just a psychic school war epic.
Takao Kasuga is a budding high-schooler who loves reading books; especially Charles Baudelaire’s ‘The Flowers of Evil’. He also has a huge crush on the popular girl in class Nanako Saeki. One day walking home he forgot his favourite book and runs back to pick it up. Unbeknownst to Kasuga he found Nanako’s P.E. uniform fallen out of the shelf. For some reason he panics, steals it and takes it home. It wasn’t long before the news of Saeki’s missing gym clothes was spread and the overbearing guilt builds up inside Takao. Then comes Sawa Nakamura, a strange and downright creepy outcast in Takao’s class who somehow witnessed him taking Nanako’s uniform. A downward spiral series of unfortunate events soon entails on our characters…
At the beginning of the episode we are demonstrated the power of spacequakes; large and mysterious disasters that have plagued the Earth for some time, this scene alone even claimed one-hundred and fifty million innocent lives. Ninety seconds later, a bright pair of pink striped panties gets shoved into your face.
It’s this awkward sense of contrast that sets the underlying tone for Date A Live.
Hayate no Gotoku! Cuties is the fourth instalment in the Hayate no Gotoku! anime series. Now, normally you would expect the first season to continue on in the second season, and so on and so forth – this isn’t the case with Hayate. The first season follows the first five volumes of the manga whereas the second season stayed faithful from volume six to fourteen. The third season thought “what the hell” and jumped ahead and beyond the timeframe of events in the manga serialising weekly at the time. This fourth season doesn’t do any better as we’re about to find out.
It goes without saying; I have a huge hard-on for Hayate. Not Hayate himself, but the anime and manga series. I fell in love with the series after reading the first volume of the manga many years ago, and to this day Season 1 is still my favourite anime of all time. The pretty animation, the funny gags, Norio Fucking Wakamoto… Based SynergySP. Season 2 was, well, ‘good’. Not as ‘good’ as Season 1 in my opinion but stayed faithful the manga, which is great but in such a way that they copied the it panel to panel, and use the exact same dialogue. Godammit, JC Staff. I was then happy to see Hayate come onto the big screen… for a disappointing 60 minutes. The movie felt lackluster, a little too short for a theatrical feature and had no signs of Wakamoto anywhere. Why Manglobe, why.
Alas we arrive at season three. Earlier this year Hata took a well lengthy hiatus from Hayate’s serialization in order to work on the new season, which turned out to be six weeks worth of storyboarding material. Did his work all pay off in the end? That, my friend, is what I’ll be reviewing today.
Note: This is an updated review from my previous blog.
Continue reading “REDUX: Hayate no Gotoku! Can’t Take My Eyes Off You Review”
I’ve been a .hack fan ever since I picked up the first volume of The Legend of the Twilight in my high school library many years ago, and have delved ever deeper into this convoluted franchise with dozens of media formats ever since. This maybe the reason .hack isn’t getting the amount of attention it deserves; people are confused where to start or that they don’t have the time, money, or resources to play the original .hack games that started it all (have you seen the prices for these games now?). To be fair, a quick gateway into the .hackiverse in my opinion would be to read the summaries on .hack//Wiki on all the original game plots as well as the general timeline of events.
Note: This is an updated review from my previous blog.
Time flies when you’re having fun, and I never had this much fun from watching a bunch of anime for the past three months. It’s a shame how fun things don’t last forever. It’s been a fun ride, but it’s time to move on. Here is my definitive review of all the anime I’ve watched for the past three months, all in glorious alphabetical order.
