animeko / アニメえこ anime fanfare

Title: Puni Puni Poemy (ぷにぷに☆ぽえみぃ Puni Puni ☆ Poemii)
Type: Mahô Shôjo, Ecchi, Shôjo-ai, Bishôjo, Sentai, Seinen
Studio: J.C. Staff
Director: Shinichi Watanabe (渡邊 慎一, Watanabe Shin'ichi)

Format Rating: 2 stars (5 stars is 16:9, DTS japanese audio, 4 stars is pro-logic and 16:9, 3 stars is 16:9 and stero sound, 2 stars is 4:3 with stereo sound, 1 star is improper format flag and less than stereo sound)
4:3 format with stereo sound. Nothing impressive here. The extras claimed to be in 5.1 though I think this was a joke.

Art Rating: 3 stars (5 stars is completely smooth with no rough transition between any CG limited use of money saving techniques, 1 is extremely shoddy)
When am I going to give someone a 2 or 1 in art? Maybe I'll have to go back and revise some things. Basic art here.

Music Rating: 2 stars
There was music?

Story Rating: 3 stars (5 stars is reading material, no plot holes, 1 star is unintelligible)
Puni Puni Poemi is a parody of magical girl anime like Sailor Moon. I enjoyed the fact that it was only two episodes and the super fast dialog keeps things entertaining. I even went back and watched the dub version just to see what it was like in English at ludicrous speed. I enjoyed this story more than Excel Saga because I was able to follow the simple plot. Poemy wants to be a voice acress, gains magical super powers and attempts to save the world.

Commendation: ma ma まぁまぁ
Overall Rating: 2.5 stars (rounded to the nearest half star)
You could call Puni Puni Poemi the son of Excel Saga. Though this is a comedy, it doesn't make me laugh. In this sense I am consistent in all my viewings of Watanabe Shin'ichi works, I am awe struck, I am entertained, but I don't find it humorous. Parodies don't generally age as well as original content because they require knowledge of what they are making fun of. However magical girl anime is still prevalent so this anime is still relevant.

Notes:

Title: "Origin: Spirits of the Past", (銀色の髪のアギト, Gin-iro no Kami no Agito, Agito the Silver-Haired)
Anime Cliche: Superhuman Power
Type: Science Fiction, Drama, Post-Apocalyptic Dystopia, Environmental

Presentation Rating: 5 stars (5 stars is 16:9, DTS japanese audio, 4 stars is pro-logic and 16:9, 3 stars is 16:9 and stero sound, 2 stars is 4:3 with stereo sound, 1 star is improper format flag and less than stereo sound)
This is a top flight presentation with 16:9 video and full digital surround sound. The quality is crisp and the soundtrack is excellent. The songs are varied and appropriate.

Art Rating: 5 stars (5 stars is completely smooth with no rough transition between any CG limited use of money saving techniques, 1 is extremely shoddy)
The art quality is superb all around. Gonzo is known for their excellent technique in animation of water and this is no exception. Certainly feature film quality animation. One of the most striking artistic features is the backgrounds, they are so detailed you will not be able to absorb it all in one sitting.

Composer: Taku Iwasaki
Music Rating: 4 stars (5 stars is perfect for the content and universally enjoyable, 1 star is totally mishandled)
From the same composer who brought you the fun and memorable Read or Die score.

Director: Keiichi Sugiyama
Story Rating: 3 stars (5 stars is reading material, no plot holes, 1 star is unintelligible)
The story was great in the setup. Agita is a boy born in the dystopian future who mischievously awakens Toola, a girl from the distant past before the apocalypse. Of course, together they have to save the world. I really liked some fresh new ideas that were presented in the story about the relationship between the forests and the people. It was unusual enough that I never felt overshadowed by the environmentalist in the shadows. Character development was average, the characters did show some growth over the period of the story for certain but for the most part you had to imagine where the characters came from and they felt rushed.

Studio: GONZO
Commendation: zettai 絶対
Overall Rating: 4 stars (rounded to the nearest star)
I was worried the average rating for the story would ruin things but the incredible art and presentation carried the day. The pacing was the biggest problem, or maybe not. That was the fastest 94min in recent memory for me. Maybe we should be praising the pacing for keeping us interested.

http://www.zanpakuto.com/viewblog.php?id=8

http://everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=1500157

Anime Cliche: Beach Episode
Type: Seinen (青年), Ecchi (エッチ), Comedy, Drama, Romance, Science Fiction

zettai 絶対
ma ma... まぁまぁ
dasai ださい　(or ダサイ）

osusume shimasu
お勧めします
dai - 大
chu - 中
sho - 小

Anime Cliche: Beach Episode
Type: Seinen (青年), Ecchi (エッチ), Comedy, Drama, Romance, Science Fiction
Author: CLAMP
Studio: MADHOUSE Ltd. (株式会社 マッドハウス, Kabushiki-gaisha Maddohausu)
Director: Morio Asaka (浅香 守生 Asaka Morio)

Format Rating: 3 stars (5 stars is 16:9, DTS japanese audio, 4 stars is pro-logic and 16:9, 3 stars is 16:9 and stero sound, 2 stars is 4:3 with stereo sound, 1 star is improper format flag and less than stereo sound)

Art Rating: 3 stars (5 stars is completely smooth with no rough transition between any CG limited use of money saving techniques, 1 is extremely shoddy)

Story Rating: 4 stars (5 stars is reading material, no plot holes, 1 star is unintelligible)

Commendation: ma ma まぁまぁ
Overall Rating: 3.5 stars (rounded up to the nearest half star)

Anime Cliche: Beach Episode
Type: Seinen (青年), Ecchi (エッチ), Comedy, Drama, Romance, Science Fiction
Author: CLAMP
Studio: MADHOUSE Ltd. (株式会社 マッドハウス, Kabushiki-gaisha Maddohausu)
Director: Morio Asaka (浅香 守生 Asaka Morio)

Format Rating: 3 stars (5 stars is 16:9, DTS japanese audio, 4 stars is pro-logic and 16:9, 3 stars is 16:9 and stero sound, 2 stars is 4:3 with stereo sound, 1 star is improper format flag and less than stereo sound)
It was 16:9 and decent stereo sound. The soundtrack was fitting for the story but not outstanding. 24 episodes across 6 DVDs, avoid the 7th DVD as it has no new content.

Art Rating: 3 stars (5 stars is completely smooth with no rough transition between any CG limited use of money saving techniques, 1 is extremely shoddy)
After recently watching some of Naruto I was very pleased with the lack of obvious story rehash you get when you stretch stories over 150 episodes. There was some repeat animation and lots of money saving techniques but they were stylized and not distracting.

Story Rating: 3 stars (5 stars is reading material, no plot holes, 1 star is unintelligible)
Chobits is the story of Hideki Motosuwa, a poor, rural, young man who is attending a college prep school and the persocom Chi, an android personal computer hybrid. There are other characters surrounding them who help them along. Hideki tends to be a bit manic and his habit of thinking outlound provides ample opportunity for comedy. He is also somewhat of a luddite and though I was initially irritated by this, it makes sense and is important for their relationship to evolve as it does. Few stories I can think of have approached the subject of "love with androids" as well as this series has done. Most stories confound the subject with flirtations with individuality or procreation but Chobits is satisfied with "humans are good at some things and persocoms are good at others".

Commendation: ma ma まぁまぁ
Overall Rating: 3 stars (rounded to the nearest star)
As you know the star rating system is an attempt at qualitative analysis and the commendation is gut feel. I would have loved to bump this one to a Highly Recommended but alas there were a few items that kept me from doing so. First of is the extent to which Chobits earns it's place as Ecchi. Most of the perversion is somewhat relevant to the story as the persocom is unable to have sex resulting in some moe 萌え pandering. On the other hand they ignore other big issues of androids like how they affect economics, whether they are sentient. Also the science fiction is light on science with Chi bordering on moho shojo 魔法少女. You have to suspend your disbelief generously, don't think about why they have androids while other technology lags behind.

Notes:
Same universe as Angelic Layer.

http://www.dannychoo.com/

anime cinnimon ass
http://www.ass-no-ryu.com/animeblog/?cat=41&paged=3

http://www.akibablog.net/

A Kotaku writer blogged about the following video. A Japanese pop idol named Shoko touring Akihabara in search of the King of Akiba. The show she is on seems to be a popular one where they take famous people and have them go research an interesting topic or maybe give a tour of their house. A large part of the show is the faces of the participants (the aforementioned famous people, usually actors) as they react to what they see.

She encounters some dude playing Taiko no Tatsujin blindfolded, nerd group dancers and another dude (with no teeth) cosplaying as anime character Haruhi Suzumiya. She then dresses up as a life-sized Evangelion figurine. None of the passer-byers think that, you know, a real human being would actually do that. A chubby guy finally recognizes her. Good for him! He's even dressed as his own self-created character called A-Hero (Akihabara Hero) and protects the Akiba "holy land" by walking around from store-to-store with other nerds. He's even got his own slogan and poses.

My jaw was completely dropped in awe when they heroic Akiba otaku recognized our heroine and describe himself as A-ヒーロー. Sugoi!
【中川翔子】 秋葉原で究極のオタクを探す 【しょこたん】

Broadcast Order

The most important thing to understand about this Anime series is that it was broadcast in a different order than the DVD release or the original Manga. The climax of the story occurs in the 7th episode of the DVD release and the 6th volume of the Manga release; "The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya Part 6"/"Suzumiya Haruhi no Yūutsu VI" (涼宮ハルヒの憂鬱VI). They changed the broadcast order to put the climax at the end, and rightfully so, imho. This is one of those situations where I wish I had been watching it at the fansub release time; unfortunately I already saw the climax of the plot on the 2nd DVD. After some more research I ended up visiting the official ASOS Brigade site and read the open letter to the fans. They explain that it was due to contractual reasons that the DVD release was not in broadcast order.
Due to pre-existing contractual obligations, the regular edition MUST contain the R2 DVD ordering of episodes. This was set in stone, there were no exceptions.

After deeply intense negotiations to try and please the existing fan-base, we are able to release a Special Bonus DVD in the TV Broadcast order as an extra. We are deeply grateful to the wonderful people at Kadokawa Pictures for their hard work and allowing this special feature for North American audience.

Both DVDs will use the improved Japanese DVD masters (anamorphic widescreen) where the dedicated people at Kyoto Animation went back and re-rendered/animated scenes into higher quality compared to the original TV broadcast.

For the Special Bonus DVD, we are taking the Japanese DVD masters, arranging them in TV Broadcast order, and putting in the next episode previews in TV Broadcast order. This creates a DVD master version of the TV Broadcast ordering that does not exist anywhere else in the world.

Hare Hare Yukai ハレ晴レユカイ (Sunny Sunny Happiness)

The ending theme and associated dance has generated an Internet meme of its own. As reported by a Newsweek article there were at one point over 2000 different videos on YouTube related to this song and dance. I have pulled a few of my favorites.

ROCKMAN(MEGAMAN) 2nd Version.
A slight improvement on the first version but destined to be forever in the shadow of the original no matter how similar. This animates the characters from Mega Man aka Rockman in Japan (ロックマン, Rokkuman). I don't think this is a Machinima in that it probably doesn't use the same engine as the console games did, but it certainly capture the spirit of Haruhi.

Prison in the Philippines is a place you go to learn to dance. From what I have found from the article I linked, this prison is run by a narcissist who enjoys musicals. Surreal is all I have to say.

驚異的人数でハレ晴レユカイを踊るoff in 秋葉原(Part2) 4/8 秋葉原中央通り
Hare Hare Yukai in Akihabara
This isn't such a great rendition, the are several attempts by this group of cosplay fans to perform in Akihabara, but I chose this clip because they are herded off by the police at the end. So Japanese!

Skittles
AMV of 'The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya' set to CandyPop by Heartsdales featuring SOUL'd OUT. I chose this one because it's one of the better edited anime music videos I have seen in a while. By Koopiskeva.

on the wii
http://kotaku.com/388355/haruhi-dances-up-the-wii

Hajime no Ippo はじめの一歩, known as 'Fighting Spirit' in America, is a great 76 episode anime based on boxing. As with most anime, it's based on a manga(tankōbon 単行本) series that helped establish a monetary foundation to justify the animation. Much like the main character, Ippo Makunouchi, works his way up from amateur to professional boxer, the manga has been running since 1990 and the anime originally aired in 2000. The series growing popularity has spawned an new game for the Nintendo Wii in 2007 called Victorious Boxers: Revolution.

In 1992 as the Ippo manga enjoyed it's second anniversary, a young rapper named LL Cool J released the single 'Mama said knock you out'.

queue fight announcer voice
"iiiiin the blue corner we have a professional featherweight boxer from Japan, Makunouchi Ippooooooo! Aaaaaand iiiiiin the red corner we have a professional heavyweight rapper from the United States, LL Cool Jayyyyyyy!" Fight!

Japanese Language Pack