Shameful Otaku Secret!

So… what’s on?

Lots of people do it, I suppose, but when I first started doing the “What’s on” posts, was I subconsciously copying Kabitzin? Probably, but then he went and got married just to copy me, so I hope we’re even. I haven’t seen a standout episode worth blogging in a while, so… what’s on at my house? (organized by how current I am, since that’s a pretty good gauge of my interest)

Caught up

Code Geass. It’s a sea change for Zero. Now that Lulu has pretty much lost everything, I’m anxious to see where the story goes. Maybe Goro and Sunrise aren’t even sure, who knows. I’ve been thinking for a while that LeDouche would end up founding a new group, consisting of Kallen, Orange, C.C. (for whatever that’s worth these days), and probably Suzaku, but I’m not sure what exactly I think this crew will actually do. What I am sure of is that Suzaku losing his marbles is pretty awesome.

Soul Eater. This one’s hitting its stride with action after some really funny non-fighting episodes. It’s getting dangerously close to the standard shounen series that it parodies, but there’s still enough style and humor to set it apart. Incidentally, I watched the Excalibur episode a couple times, making it Soul Eater’s first repeat for me in a while. America!

The Return of Maid Guy. I hope public outcry has brought those fansubbers back on for the duration (two more episodes), because the ridiculous Miko episode was gold. In fact, it was so brilliant, it was a fanservice show about fanservice. Meta.

Real Drive. When you take a step back, RD is just a series of portraits of this future world that Shirow has created, with Nyamo serving as a window for the viewer to look through. Still not a lot of people watching this one, but I’m glad to see that they’re all very vocal about how much they love it.

Macross F. Sheryl went through a nice period of “Who’s moe now, bitch?” but it looks like Ranka’s getting a little taste of pain just as she realizes how smitten she is with Alto, for whom shoujo bubbles were seemingly invented. Hopefully Alto won’t be fighting his next battle in a nice boat instead of a variable fighter. The self-shipping/everyone’s-on-a-date episode was dumb to me. And by the way… triangles, we get it. Worse than the freaking pineapple dessert. Anyway, I’m watching, still up to date… but for some reason I’m not doing a lot of caring. Oh yeah, the animation is dog shit. See above, Sinbad.

Daughter of 20 Faces. Chiko’s aunt has yet to learn that her niece is immune to soup-based attacks, but Tome has thankfully put those to a stop with a little blackmail. Akechi’s starting to look formidable, and though he seems nice enough, I don’t think he’s looking for Twenty Faces so he can make friends. It seems like the series is getting a tad sloppy lately, but I’m still on board and ready to find out what the hell TF did to himself in the lab to get so un-killable.

Behind

Bonin’ knows, am dough. aka, Xam’d: Lost Memories, aka Bonen No Xamdou aka Bounen No Zamned aka 亡念のザムド aka bleeeeearararagh. You could bullet list the similarities to Eureka Seven: motley ship crew (mailmen rather than surfers), organic mecha things, familial issues, grumpy captain. But as OGT mentioned, Xam’d opted to start with a bang instead of Eureka’s gradual ramp-up. Like Soul Eater’s first couple episodes, Xam’d grabs you with its action, energetic mood, and typically awesome Bones style. Don’t expect too many more episodes of 20 Faces with great animation though, since the Xam’d crew is currently wallpapering their cubicles with approximately Lichenstein’s annual defense budget. Even though I’m behind, this one is high on my list.

Blassreiter. Maybe there’s something wrong with me, but when the series took a brighter turn toward action and away from everyone dying, my interest level dropped. There’s just not enough dark stuff going on in my anime lately. Still, Amanda is one of my favorite characters currently, and who doesn’t want to see Wolf get his just desserts deserts desserts whatever.

Nabari No Ou. Still watching. Still gay. It got pretty cool for a while, with Miharu playing both sides and everyone stepping up their game. I’m pretty far behind on this one, but the big make-out session is inevitable, right?

Itazura Na Kiss. I really love the fact that a romantic anime has the balls to go past the wedding. Unfortunately, Kotoko still hasn’t grown as a character much, and the gender role issues that are coming to the fore make a somewhat progressive Yankee like me uncomfortable. But it’s cute, and the humor is still spot-on much of the time.

Kind of stopped caring.

Kyouran Kazoku Nikki. I still push play with excited abandon, but for a few episodes now I’ve been met with disappointment. The American-accented teacher was a riot, but what is this thing they’ve introduced? … oh god, it’s a plot.

Koihime Musou. I tried. I’m not sure why, but I tried. KM has a good heart, and piles of fanservice, but really, it’s dumb. As you can see, I am watching a lot of anime right now and I just don’t have room for Samurai Girl-on-Girl Pantyshot Showdown, fun as that sounds.

Golgo 13. I watch it whenever I’m bored and have no backlog, which is rarely. But the episodic format makes it great for just that. I can pick up Duke whenever I want and not worry that I won’t know what’s going on.

Special Rapey Bonus

Detroit Metal City. Go watch this thing. It’s fucking hilarious. It doesn’t have anything to do with Detroit (trust me, I lived there), but it has a lot to do with pig-bitch-rape, patricide, and sensitive artists. There’s not a big time commitment — it flies by at about ten rapes a second — and it packs a lot of laughs into a short, unique period.

So… there’s my schedule of watching (and generally not blogging) about cartoons. I don’t know how it happened, I just looked up one day and I was watching a lot of shit. Anyone else have this kind of anime load right now?

Howdy! Bye, now!

Oh, Chiko. I don’t envy you. Your aunt’s still trying to off you with soup, or the occasional desperate and ineffectual sneak-attack on a boat. Your best friend thinks you’re a novelty and occasionally pretends to be you just to get in trouble. Your only real friend is your murderous aunt’s servant. And now the latter two, along with the numbnuts detective who “found” you, have all gone hypnotized by some white-haired zombie cyborg demon doll who’s in love with Twenty Faces.

Oh yeah, you’re homeless, and it’s raining. That just sucks. What? Cyborg woman is holding your only friend ransom… Jesus.

Well, all is well, since you’ve found Twenty Faces! Sure, zombie doll bitch is all about killing you out of jealousy, but didn’t we all know that Akechi secretly was Twenty Faces all along?

Wait, he’s not? Okay, so Twenty Faces just disguised himself as Detective Akechi. Hm. Still following, just less so.

So Twenty Faces kills zombie doll lady, cool, but then he falls off a blimp to save you? Ouch! Meaning, you got him back, stabbed him while hypnotized, finally came to your senses, and he’s gone again?

Wow. Did I mention I don’t envy Chiko?

What the hell is going on?

The reunion of Ken, Chiko, and the Boss didn’t have time to be sweet and sappy because they were pretty much under threat of death the whole time. I think that gave us a nice indication of the new darker and more urgent atmosphere — that it’s never going to be the happy Robin Hood’s merry-men party that they used to be living in. Of course, an eyepatch is always a dead giveaway too.

Cyborg-love-interest is gone, but so is Twenty Faces. Or is he? The scene near the end of episode 13 really hints that he’s actually dead this time, but his work isn’t finished, and TF seems like the kind of guy who would gladly cheat death to get the job done.

Say what you will about Twenty Faces (no one is saying much, actually), but these past three episodes gave me what I like the most about the show. First, the rare action scenes are creative and well-animated with a sense of style that I think only Bones could really pull off. And more importantly, the story keeps me guessing, something it’s been doing ever since Twenty Faces disappeared. Love it. I also love the way the writers gave viewers an “I knew it!” moment when Akechi turned out to be Twenty Faces, only to take it away by revealing that he wasn’t.

This backstory on Akine really seems superfluous, and cyborg lover went down pretty easy (she just kind of gave up living), but I can’t say I have real complaints about the direction of the show lately.

As a side note, anyone notice that the visual effects in the OP make noise now, like motion graphics on a Fox TV broadcast? Kind of goofy and lame.

Remote Island Syndrome

Movie time! Chiko, her aunt, and Tame trek to a secluded island under the guise of seeing a movie shoot, each with her own ulterior motives. See if you can match the goal to the character, kids!

• Find the jewel and see if it leads to Twenty Faces‘ whereabouts
• Kill Chiko
• Stop Chiko from being killed

There they run into Eye-Patch, aka Ken, aka Akito Tenkawa from Nadesico after he comes back all dark and broody in Prince of Darkness. He ain’t happy.

But it’s a funtime family reunion when it comes down to saving each others’ lives. Little do either of them know, Twenty Faces may have been working on a project during the war to turn ordinary humans into rubber Mazinger Z dolls. And one of them lured Chiko to the island using the jewel.

Chiko graduates

The highlight for me was the scene from one of the nifty action sequences in the show’s OP. That’s pretty neat to finally see in itself, but in this scene Chiko goes from spunky thief-girl to ultimate badass. Ken and the humonculus (or whatever she is) both notice how much like Twenty Faces she suddenly looks. And they’re both scared by it.

What’s next?

OGT has been speculating on the nature of the second half the series; his thoughts are that either Chiko’s going to get increasingly bitter and angry as she finds out more about Twenty Faces’ seedy past experimenting with Frakenstein-esque human hax, or she’s going to find out she’s been punked. I lean more toward the former, possibly because I just hope it’s not the other. For Twenty Faces to pop out at the end and say… “You passed!” reeks too much of the old “it was all a dream” trick.

No matter what, the Twenty Faces continues to be super-fun, and I’ll bet you anything that the first season ends with a bitching cliffhanger.

I’ll leave you dirty, dirty, fanboys with a bonus.