![[gg]_Mawaru_Penguindrum_-_01_[B8C345E7].mkv_snapshot_16.25_[2011.07.08_21.34.44]](http://www.shamefulotakusecret.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/gg_Mawaru_Penguindrum_-_01_B8C345E7.mkv_snapshot_16.25_2011.07.08_21.34.44.jpg)
I won’t say anything else because it feels like trying to explain how I feel about this show at this point, is useless and will read like high-brow elitist posturing. Yes, it has all those things going for it.
I’ve seen better-executed melodrama and comedy concerning life, death, fate, family in the first half of the pilot episode than anything a show like AnoHana can ever possibly hope for. So it’s time to recalibrate our expectations of what anime can do again. Because this is incredible.
With that, we also must prepare to be incredibly disappointed. But I like this kind of bet. Watch this show.
Fucking Ikuhara bringing the FIRE. As I mentioned, No. 6 had a fuckmazing opening episode, but after this, everything is blown away.
HYPE MOTHERFUCKER
I totally watched this raw last night, because I didn’t feel like waiting.
But yeah, fantastic first episode, and great to see Ikuhara’s style and flair updated for 21stC anime production techniques.
I don’t blame you.
Brilliantly executed, ambitious, intense as fuck, cute as hell, & as creepy as we know anime can be. Penguindrum 01 is the best of the now right now.
I think I really feel I’m living in an exciting time for anime, or what I feel I should’ve felt back when Fractale was airing. I do hope Yamakan watches this, chokes on his own spit, and resolves to do better anime.
The visuals are quite stunning, but I think you’ve hit the nail on the head. This is a show that already knows exactly what it’s doing with its time, and that’s surprisingly precious in our medium.
Considering this is apparently a two-cour series, I can’t even imagine how much it may cram into that time.
2 cours? HYYYYYPE!
Ikuhara isn’t the most prolific guy in the world (at least not since the end of the Sailor Moon reign) but that is the impression that Utena’s first episode gives as well, so I guess he’s pretty good at achieving that.
Seconding otou-san here, as I felt something similar when I watched the first ep of Utena: “this… is something.”
I had expectations for the show then, and I was impressed to that extent just the same. Here I did not know what to expect but I even think the result was more impressive because it confronted me with everything I thought anime was like here in 2011 and then whispered in my ear, daring-like, taunting-like, “you are also wrong… I am better than that.”
At some point during the first episode this big smile popped up on my face and stayed there until the very end. I’m not sure exactly when it happened–maybe the part with the boy who is always facing away from the camera, maybe the penguin with the umbrella, maybe the ridiculous transformation scene. Not really sure.
But yeah, the first thought that popped into my mind after seeing this is that IKUHARA IS BACK. I don’t know if this is going to be anywhere near as good as Utena, but I haven’t gotten this excited about a show for ages (well, except for maybe Madoka Magica)
Also, are the two girls in the ED opposite the sister gender-flipped versions of the brothers? Because that would cast a very different light on things
Okay, a further note: those two cartoon mascots seen in the train advertisements. One of them has reddish hair, the other has blue hair. The girls in the ED have reddish hair and blue hair, respectively. So do the brothers.
This CAN’T be a coincidence! Unless this is like Miki’s stopwatch, or something. Which is possible.
Ikuhara red herring alert: I can only preach vigilance, unless we get stopwatched. But hey, I can still hear it… the ticking from that damned watch haunting me from The End of The World…
Anyway, like you… a smile just plastered itself on my face at some point in the show I don’t know when. But see, I had no idea it was Ikuhara directing this until I started writing this post when I finished the ep. I had felt so good about it even before my respect for Utena kicked in.
On an even further note: from what we’ve seen so far, the series is flooded with so much train imagery–episodes are called stations, train transit is pointed out with directional signs (which appear in the OP!), flashbacks proceeded by arrival displays–that it appears very unlikely that anything involving trains is coincidental.
So I think the mascots have a pretty good chance of being important. You can even see them around the house of the main characters! Or something. Click. 12:23. Shocked expression. Whatever.
Read animekritik’s post — let’s move the discussion there since he’ll have more interesting things to say than the hype I’ve done here. This post has done its job now that ak is blogging the show.
Thank god I have a current show to blog this year!!
Good, since I didn’t want to do a lengthy series on this myself. The show is in
goodexactly the right hands. Hehehe.Pingback: Mawaru Penguin Drum 01: Idealism « Kritik der Animationskraft
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xElipsgRA74&hd=1
ENDLESS REPEAT
yeesssss
Can you imagine how full of fuck my mind was when I realized the song in the background was THIS?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tsa1ZyrFGj0
you can’t unhear.
ROKUROO MAAAAAAAN
Kinda soured on this first episode. Family member dies, comes back to life; seen it before. I’m not sure if they were going for a psychedelic vibe with the transformation scene, but it didn’t come across that way. It was too poppy for that.
Kinda soured on this comment. Claims to have seen things before; as if new stuff appears regularly. I’m not sure if this commenter is just being a hipster but it didn’t come across that way. It was too trollish for that.
Are you really judging whether the show should be new based on how many shows are like that? I guess shows shouldn’t be good either, since most of them are pretty crap.
?
Totally the best thing of the decenny.
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