Anime Review: Sister Princess

Wow, I haven't posted since Sunday—that's weird. I haven't really done much of anything since Sunday, to be honest. But with this whole 'review backlog' thing I have going, figured I should start writing them.

I went into Sister Princess after watching the first ten episodes of Gundam 00. Gundam 00 made me want to kill myself, and while I will finish it (including season 2 + movie) I needed a break in an extreme way. My expectations of Sister Princess were low—so I figured, no chance of it disappointing me.

The Basics

Episodes: 26

Genre: Comedy, Drama, Romance, Slice of Life, Harem

Aired: April 4, 2001 to September 26, 2001

Directed by: MAL refuses to tell me

Producers: Starchild Records

Opening Theme: Love Destiny by Yui Horie

Closing Theme: Tsubasa by Yui Horie

Review

The Story: Wataru Minakami is the top student in his high school and is accurately portrayed as an incredible nerd. I mean, look at that: 

Well, thanks to a computer glitch, he utterly failed his high school entrance exam. It looks like he's about to spend a year doing nothing (read: the joys of cram school) when he's borderline kidnapped and sent to Promised Island, where he is to attend Stargazer Hill Academy. But not only that: it also turns out he has thirteen younger sisters that he never knew about, and not all of them were aware of each other. Still—they all really love their big brother.

Based on knowing this beforehand, all I could figure was that the anime would be the sort of thing Kirino would love. You know, little sisters loving their big brother and all. Turns out, that wasn't accurate at all...which is good, because some of the sisters were like below the age of ten and that would have been creepy/disturbing/get-this-away-from-me on so many levels. Instead, Sister Princess was a light-hearted story about pretty typical brother-sister things, minus all the hair-pulling and theft. I'd say it's the best family since the Brady Bunch.

The Characters: Okay, so we have Wataru, and we have thirteen sisters. We also have like...two other random people. That's our cast. With thirteen sisters to keep track of, I figured I would never be able to do it. I figured: I will identify them by hair color, there will be no name memory except for maybe four of them.

To my surprise, each and every sister was characterized incredibly well, and before I knew it, I was entirely familiar with every last sister, knowing which interest was theirs and all. Now that is what I call masterful charactization—when you can give me 13 younger sisters and make them all fully-fleshed out so I know them well...why can't a lot of shows today do that so well? Seriously, there are so many forgettable characters now, ones I forget about an hour after finishing a series, and even having watched Sister Princess a few weeks ago now, I still know which is which.

Wataru was also well-done. He kind of reminded me a Studio Key guy—Tomoya or Yuuichi maybe. But not as awesome.

The Random Yaoi: Sister Princess, 26 episodes. Sometimes a few of the sisters would mention wanting to marry their brother in a surprisingly non-incestuous way. So that's straight. And Wataru likes girls. Definitely. No secret. He gets all blushy when his sisters are hugging him too much and in the beginning, before he knows some of them are his sisters he sees them as attractive.

Well then, near the end, Wataru's friend Akio shows up on the island. Akio is first seen in episode one and then not ever seen again until the end, though Wataru does spend the entire series writing emails to him. And he wants Wataru to come back to Tokyo with him. And we get this: 

To be perfectly honest, this may be the first time my inner yaoi fangirl has ever told the obvious seme to go fuck himself. You want Wataru to leave his sisters? Not cool man. Not cool at all.

Conclusion?: The whole thing where I had no expectations, so I couldn't be disappointed? In comparison to those non-existent expectations, Sister Princess actually managed to impress the hell out of me. It was really, really good. There wasn't what I'd call an overwhelming plot, but this anime didn't need one. It did well with its little one-episode arcs, its focus on the familial relationship. Not the sort of thing I'd expect to enjoy in any way, but hey—I'm not going to complain when an anime series exceeds my expectations.

If you're looking for something nice and light-hearted, I would seriously recommend giving Sister Princess a watch.

There's also the second season, Sister Princess RePure, which takes place a few years later when all of them are living separately. I'm not going to go to the trouble of reviewing it, because really it's more of the same. If you enjoy the first season, you'll enjoy the second.

My rating: 7/10. Just because I enjoyed it didn't mean it was without its flaws. It was nothing special. (Who knows, maybe if I watched more anime from that time range I'd disagree.)

Anime Review: Dragon Crisis!

Oh, Dragon Crisis!, the series that gets to say it was the first I kept up with and finished. I'm really not sure how I feel about that. Read on to understand why.

The Basics

Episodes: 12

Genre: Action, Ecchi, Fantasy, School, Shounen

Aired: December 16, 2010 to March 29, 2010

Directed by: Hideki Tachibana

Producers: Studio Deen

Opening Theme: Immoralist by Yui Horie

Closing Theme: Mirai Bowl by Momoiro Clover

Review

The Story: According to MyAnimeList, this series is about Ryuji Kisaragi stealing a box with is cousin Eriko (from people who basically qualify as mobsters) and from the box comes Rose, a red dragon who is totally shaped like a blonde, chestless lolita, and Ryuji decides to protect her. I would like to disagree with this. They do indeed steal a box and find Rose inside, but it's not about him protecting her, really.

It's Another Teen Drama.

Basically, they meet new characters and have vague interactions with them for a variety of purpose before the other person joins their team. Minus Onyx, who is actually the villain. A pretty cool villain. Other than him, there's an arc involving the theft of a sword and an evil dead dragon, one involving a wolf-girl-chick, one episode with a crazy scientist lady who is plain crazy and then some fighting. Also, a lot of blushing and 'I love you' and 'Ryuji!' and 'I love Ryuji' and other stuff.

That about sums up the...uh...plot? (Not sure it qualifies as a plot.)

The Characters: I want to slap them. At least most of them. Let's get this straight, guys: characters should NOT I repeat, NOT exist merely to complement each other and be in love with each other. You see it all the time in YA novels (read: Twilight, Edward and Bella—no purpose other than each other) and it's annoying there as well. They should be their own individual people, you should be able to tell that they clearly have their own useful existences and Ryuji and Rose...I can't even say how much they don't have this. They are completely immersed in each other in every sense of the word, in that if one didn't exist there would be no point to the other.

The rest of the cast isn't quite that bad. Now they are in no way a great bunch of people, and really they're all pretty single-characteristic people, no depth to them whatsoever. But at least they can stand on their own two feet with those single characteristics. Eriko likes to play around, Maruga is all serious and devoted to her people (at least I think that's what she's devoted to), Ai is...I don't even know, Sapphi is the cutesy character, and there are a few other people as well.

By far the best member of the cast was the villain, Onyx, and I am not saying that just because he was voiced by Hiroshi Kamiya. ...Maybe.

The Teen Drama: All I have to say is, in a series where the villain's true form looks like this: 

Why on earth would you focus on this?:

Conclusion?: Dragon Crisis!...don't watch Dragon Crisis!. From the very beginning, I was watching it because it was there. And I'm stubborn, so I always keep watching whether I'm enjoying something or not. By the end of this series I just wanted to rip my hair out. OR leap into my computer screen and murder Ryuji and/or Rose.

Prettymuch, if you want a series that is mostly about typical teenage 'do they like me? as much as I like them?' crap and just happens to have creatures who take the shape of dragons, ohhhh, twice maybe? Go for it. This anime will be right up your ally. Or if you just want to a see a blonde, flat-chested loli voiced by Rie Kugimiya (I may or may not be referring to another blogger here), it's also for you. I encourage you.

But if you want plot and characters who are totally people and figure you got enough teen drama at your high school? Back the hell away if you know what's good for you. Don't make my mistake.

My rating: 3/10. ...No, just no. Every single one of those three points came from Hiroshi Kamiya's presence.

Anime Review: Angel Beats!

Studio Key, my friend...you've done it again. ...Though I think you may actually be more of a frienemy.

The Basics

Episodes: 13

Genre: Action, Comedy, Supernatural

Aired: March 22, 2010 to June 25, 2010

Directed by: Seiji Kishi

Producers: Aniplex, Kyoto Animation, P.A. Works, Visual Art's

Opening Theme: My Soul, Your Beats! by Lia / My Soul, Your Beats! ~Rock Version~ by Lisa

Closing Theme: Brave Song by Aoi Tada / Ichiban no Takaramono by Karuta

Review

The Story: In Angel Beats! Yuzuru Otonashi wakes up in another world—well, it turns out he's dead. Not that he remembers his life, or even really realizes he's dead. He meets a girl who tells him he's now part of a battlefront and they're allies. Of course, at the time, she's also trying to shoot at another girl she says is their enemy. So he, being something of a disbelieving nincompoop (note: part of my goal in blog posts is to work in words that I have no excuse to use elsewhere) decides to go down and speak with her. When she tells him he's dead, he tells her to prove and well...she stabs him through the heart.

He wakes up later.

Prettymuch, he ends up joining this group of people who are at a school where most of it's really just AI, with programmed students. They, however, aim to avoid becoming just like the AI and remain themselves. Which is a pretty reasonable goal, considering the AI people are lame. Oh, and it's probably also important to note that they're stuck in this world because they aren't at peace with their old lives, there are things they want to do...somewhat problematic when you can't actually remember your life. Which some do, and some don't.

The series revolves around the group fighting Tenshi (girl who stabbed him), among other battles.

The Characters: To be perfectly honest, Angel Beats! didn't really have what I would call the strongest cast from a Studio Key series. The characters were okay, and some really impressed me. I mean, anyone who saw my Top Ten Anime Females post should know Kanade made that list, and therefore it's pretty easy to know I see her as a strong character.

What gets me about the cast of the series is that they're kind of half and half between weak and strong characters, flat ones and multi-faceted ones. Some of the group is simple—like, don't get me wrong, I love TK, but he didn't really have much to him and on the whole was a bit dull in retrospect. Then there are the ones like Yuzuru or his best friend Hideki who have so much more to them. Or even Naoi, who at first seems to be a bit of an ass and then it turns out he's just a little brat.

On the whole, this cast isn't awful, it just isn't wonderful, especially compared to the cast of say, Haruhi Suzumiya.

The one thing I will say was delightful about this cast was that it gave me the opportunity for this:

The Backstories: Key. What. The. Hell. All right, like I mentioned above, each person is stuck in that world because there's something they want to do. Typically, it's because their life sucked in some way and therefore well, they didn't manage to do what they wanted.

Now I should have seen this coming. I knew walking into the series that it was from Key, but maybe I'd gotten my hopes up having watch K-ON! just before, that maybe, maybe, maybe it would be slightly happier. Though I guess with a title like Angel Beats!, who was I kidding? It's got the word 'angel' and it's Key. That is just a straight shot down Depression Boulevard right there.

So yeah. Character #1's (no names from me—no spoilers!) story is told and oh, there are tears in my eyes. Keep going. Another history, more tears. Wash, rinse, and repeat.

But then, those histories were probably the strongest part of the series.

Conclusion?: Walking into Angel Beats!, I was a bit...confused. Iffy? Not sure what I was getting into? This is because when I first entered the blogging scene, there were posts about the series, somewhere I was looking. And I'd read that it lost its steam partway through and sorta failed.

To be honest (maybe this is because I'm biased in the favor of Studio Key at all times) I disagree completely. I felt that the series maintained itself wonderfully the entire way through. It was multi-faceted, the plot changed a bit and got more interesting. So while the characters weren't really always the best, the series on the whole was just as strong as the magic trio of Clannad, Kanon and Air.

Just not quite as tearful.

My rating: 9/10. No really, I mean it. It was on the level of Kanon. Which I loved less than Clannad and Air. But only by one point, and in this case that point is lost because of the presence of some lame characters.

Anime Review: K-ON!

I ended up motivating myself to watch K-ON! after Yi's recent post on the topic of side characters. So, here it is.

The Basics

Episodes: 13

Genre: Comedy, Music, Slice of Life

Aired: April 2, 2009 to June 25, 2009

Directed by: Naoka Yamada

Producers: Kyoto Animation, Pony Canyon, Movic

Opening Theme: Cagayake! Girls by Aki Toyosaki

Closing Theme: Don't Say “Lazy” by Yoko Hikasa

Review

The Story: K-ON! is very much a slice of life story at its best. A group of girls (Ritsu, Mio, Tsumugi/Mugi and Yui) are just entering high school. Basically, Ritsu can't decide on a club she wants to join and then she ends up figuring the Light Music Club would be a good idea—well, there's a problem with that: all of the members graduated, so unless they can get four members, it's going to be unofficially disbanded. Ritsu decides to take on the challenge of re-forming the club with herself as the president.

Really, it isn't much of a challenge. She recruits her friend Mio, Mugi joins, and Yui kinda wanders in thinking “light music” translates to “easy music”. Well, not quite. But she sticks around anyway even after finding out that's not what it means.

The series follows these four girls and their antics as they practice, hang out, and play their music. Like I said: slice of life at its finest.

 

The Characters: Other than their membership in the Light Music Club, these girls are pretty different. Ritsu sorta has the Haruhi Suzumiya “do anything!” pumped-up mindset. Mio is a shy girl, easily made to blush. Mugi is a wealthy, sweet girl who has a thing for nice food and sweets. And Yui...Yui is just out of it. That's all there is to be said about that girl.

I'm not going to paint these girls as the most well-developed characters, because really, they aren't. I mean, they aren't underdeveloped, but they are sort of...they have a few aspects to them and that's all you see. It didn't really bug me much though, because honestly, they didn't need to have more than what was there. Sure, it would have been nice, but the characters worked fine as they were.

I suspect that maybe when I watch season 2 in the vaguely near future, I'll see some more sides of the characters.

The Songs: They're the Light Music Club. Now what the heck does that even mean? Honestly, I had no clue when I first got started in watching the series. Tell me they're the Choir Club and yeah, I follow you there, but Light Music Club? Turns out that apparently means band. Like, for real band. With drums and a guitar and a keyboard and singing and all that jazz. (Note: All that jazz is a phrase I do not get to use nearly often enough.)

So along with being a band comes that fun thing where you write your own songs, and these girls do just that. Now let me say: the songs are not very good, comparatively speaking. But for a group of high school girls who are basically in it just to have fun and express their high school-ness, yeah, they're not half-bad. They're basically of the “get up and have fun” variety. I will never complain about that.

Basically, I cannot complain about these songs. I can call them amateurish. But there will be no complaints.

Conclusion?: For basic slice of life, K-ON! isn't bad at all. It's a fun-filled, cheerful series that isn't half-bad when it comes to comedy. I've found that series which aren't specifically labeled as comedy actually tend to make me laugh more than the ones that are, oddly enough...

But anyway. Considering the fact that it's from Studio Key, I expected some serious tears. Because...well, it's Key. They seem to get their jollies (← another phrase I don't get to use nearly enough) going “happy, happy, happy, NOW WE ARE RIPPING OUT YOUR SOUL AND YOU WILL CRY LIKE A BABY”. Just, you know. Something I've noticed from experiences with Air, Clannad and Kanon. So in K-ON! I was sitting there like a paranoid freak (this is what you've done to me, Key!) just waiting for something bad to happen.

I was pleasantly surprised by a lack of tears.

So prettymuch, I recommend K-ON! if you like Key and don't want to cry. Or if you like slice of life and don't want to cry. If you generally just like smiling while watching anime, I recommend K-ON!.

Oh for the love of god, go watch K-ON!.

My rating: 7/10. Okay, so I was singing praises of this anime. Go ahead and question this less-than-epic rating. ...Look. K-ON! had a standard to live up, and that standard is...well, those ones I listed that made me and everyone I know cry. It did not live up. Poor K-ON!.

Anime Review: MM!

Without having the slightest clue what this series was going to be, I went ahead and downloaded it. When you don't know what to expect...well, there's no expectations to be lived up to. And when you don't even know what a series is about...that results in watching some crazy, crazy things.

The Basics

Episodes: 12

Genre: Comedy

Aired: September 26, 2010 to December 18, 2010

Directed by: Tsuyoshi Nagasawa

Producers: Xebec, AT-X

Opening Theme: Mecha Mote I Love You by Gokujou!! Mecha Mote Iinchou / Help! ~Heaven Side~ by MM!

Closing Theme: Kirei ni Naritai by Gokujou!! Mecha Mote Iinchou / Mecha Mote! Summer by Gokujou!! Mecha Mote Iinchou

Review

The Story: I feel like I could just say “There is no story here” and be done with it and it wouldn't be a lie. But then, that wouldn't be very helpful to anyone reading this. So I suppose I'll say more.

Basically, the main character Sado Tarou has a bit of an issue. And by issue, I mean shenanigans-inducing-plot-device. He's a masochist, of epic proportions. As in, when a woman hits him (his masochism doesn't apply to men) or kicks him or abuses him verbally, and so on, he goes like this: 

 

Kind of a problem, right? Also: mildly disturbing. But he's in love with this girl and he wants to get this problem solved before he confesses to her. His best friend, Tatsukichi, recommends he ask the Second Volunteer Club for help. So he goes off to the club and there he finds Mio Isurugi, who ends up determined to solve this issue. By beating the crap out of him some more. He also finds Yuno Arashiko, the one who first caused him to become a masochist—she's terrified of men to the point where if one touches her, she lashes out and hits them, so she's a member of the club herself while they work to solve that. Which is exactly what happens with Sado.

As mentioned above, shenanigans ensue. Twelve episodes of them.

The Characters: There is no sanity in this series. Not one single normal character. They're all freaking crazy and I am so glad I don't live anywhere near them. I've already explained our main character's issues, and Yuno's. Mio is probably the most regular of the bunch, but I'm also pretty sure she's Haruhi Suzumiya—she even dons the bunny outfit at one point. So that, in and of itself makes her crazy.

Tatsukichi? Well, that girl Tarou was in love with? Yeah, that's Tatsukichi crossdressing.

Tarou's boss is one of those people who make otaku look insane—as in I half-expected him to have married a body pillow by the end of the series, though I'm also relieved to say it didn't go that far. His mother and sister both love him, a bit too much. The school nurse has an obsession with taking pictures of attractive girls. The class rep for Tarou's class worships Mio like a goddess. Young Noa...well, this: 

 

And her assistant has a serious loli-complex going on.

There's no depth. They're all too crazy for depth. But they manage to pull off entertaining sometimes, so they're not...nevermind. I'd was going to say they're not awful. But they are. They really are.

The...what?: I'm having trouble thinking of anything for this series. Nothing about it stood out to me, nothing was spectacular or special. I mean, I guess the shenanigans. But it's really better so see those for yourself.

So I will just leave this section with this:

Conclusion?: Most of my time watching MM! was spent thinking, “What am I watching?”, “What just happened?”, “Whoa!” or a combination of the three. Seriously, there's crack anime (Ika Musume), and then there's...then there's this. It's like they took crack, added a few extra doses and decided there wasn't enough wrong with the series so they stuffed it in a blender with medications that are not meant to be mixed.

And also alcohol. Lots and lots of alcohol.

The story is non-existent, the characters are one-dimensional, the art is nothing special...

Basically, if you're like me—not a fan of crude humor and recycled jokes—this anime not going to be for you. Because it certainly wasn't for me. Now on the other hand, if you like crude humor and don't mind recycled jokes, go for it. Personally, I can only be amused by Yuno sending Tarou flying and turning him on so many times before it's just annoying.

My rating: 2/10. If I knew what was good for me, I would have stopped after episode one. Half of episode one. But as I've mentioned before, I'm stubborn. Besides, +1 to the 150 Anime Challenge, I'll suffer through almost anything. Really though, MM!i s a crap-tastic series. I can't think of a single redeeming quality. Other than this looking totally delicious: