Shameful Otaku Secret!

The world changes

Well, it didn’t happen. I had all my posts scheduled but one. The final one. Rather than making excuses, here it is, a few days late and a couple dollars short, since now I’m sick from my holidays and doped up on cold medicine and possibly unable to form sentences.

This year, regardless of your knowledge or opinion on the matter of fansubbing and its legality, you doubtless noticed that a few companies, all in different areas of the distribution chain, created online solutions to something they saw as a problem. Funimation has added legit streaming of a freshly-licensed, currently-airing show, Shikabane Hime, and [duh, Bandai] is airing a simlutaneous series (Black God) on American cable TV. TV Tokyo partnered with Crunchyroll to bring the mega-series Bleach, Naruto, and Shugo Chara! to North America in realtime with an HD stream. And Sony broadcast Xam’d all over the world through the Playstation Network.

But it all started with Blassreiter and Tower of Druaga by Gonzo. That sometimes-maligned, currently in-the-red animation studio with a penchant for “adult”-oriented violence series and overuse of CG suddenly launched itself — and the rest of us — into a brave new world where borders break down, regions transform from “Japan” and “North America” into “the world,” and a licensing company isn’t even needed anymore.

Of course, once the idea was hit on, the licensing companies (namely Funi) jumped on the stream wagon, but the TV Tokyo/Crunchy deal proves that we may still be able to break down the barriers. Fundamental problems, such as DRM, resolution, and availability outside of North America have yet to be ironed out, but when I think of how amazing Gonzo’s springtime announcment was, I get some faith.

And his name that sat upon him was Gonzo

During the Spring of this year, Gonzo’s initial online streaming experiment began with two series: Tower of Druaga and BLASSREITER. Both shows were featured not only on Crunchyroll and BOST TV, but YouTube as well for an unlimited time. Tower of Druaga was pretty well-liked, and its twist ending caused some interest in Gonzo’s new properties. Then, of course, Panty Witches was a raging success of the dumbest kind. So what about Blassreiter, arguably the most “Gonzo-like” of the series?

Well, it doesn’t immediately stand out the way either Strike Witches or Druaga did. The series tends to slip into Gonzo’s comfort zone pretty quickly, and as such exhibits a quite a few of their typical problems. But it’s not without merit either — in fact, at times it was really engaging.

Story

Without getting too much into it, since part of the fun is watching the story unfold, Blassreiter tells the story of a human augmentation project — somewhere between Twenty Faces’ cybernetic super-soldiers and Gendo’s Human Instrumentality — gone horribly awry. The augmented monsters, called Amalgams, start running all amok in Germany on their way to destroy and remake the entire world. Through it all, the only people with the balls to try and save the world are some glorified cops on motorcycles.

XAT uniforms require cleavage, regardless of gender. I found this to be pretty progressive on Gonzo’s part.

Characters

The series gets a few episodes in before you finally realize who it’s actually about, and it’s not so much racing hero Gerd Frenzen (which you might think through two or three episodes) as it is XAT cops Amanda and Hermann. By the final episode, they’ve become fantastic leads. Amanda is the strongest female I’ve seen in anime in a very long time. If you’re looking for her to break down and need a man at some point, take your moe elsewhere — she stays on point for 25 episodes.

And, she’s a pink-haired looker!

Animation

Notoriously, a lot of people (myself included) ditched this show from minute one when they saw just how bad Gonzo’s trademark CG had gotten. It was like a video game had invaded my anime. But two things happened: First, it got better. The CG fight scenes between the dextrous amalgams were fast-moving and creatively directed. And second, I watched a couple Speed Grapher episodes and saw to exactly what level Gonzo will stoop if they don’t feel like animating a vehicle using cels.

CG motorcycles it is, then.

I mean, motorcycles are cool, right? Right?

The Gonzo Factor

Gonzo tend to try really hard to make their “adult” shows seem very “adult.” That usually means gratuitous violence and ridiculously amped-up sexuality (lol bewbs), combined in a way that makes everything feel decidedly un-adult. Rather than upping the sex-and-violence quotient, Blassreiter’s crew opted to use hopelessness, despair, religious themes, and insane amounts of character death to create something you might actually find somewhat mature.

Themes

Blassreiter’s characters struggle most with trying to maintain their belief systems and their sense of right and wrong in a jacked-up world where most of their friends have been needlessly slaughtered (sometimes twice). A lot of the characters are Christian and question their religious beliefs, and Zwölf is a church-operated organization, but Christianity is a theme that remains mostly unexplored. Ultimately, the characters like Gerd who become Amalgams cling to any belief, even if they doubted it during life, just to try to remain human as their basest instincts start to take over their minds.

Bottom Line

Blassreiter was part of an experiment for Gonzo. They’re not doing all that well money-wise, but they dumped 2 million USD into Crunchyroll, so something apparently worked (probably Panty Witches, actually…). [Edit comes in the form of getting schooled in my comments section — that money came in April so it's actually part of what powered this whole thing.] Considering more Crunchy shows this season and the off-balance amount of Gonzo stuff in Funimation’s iTunes store, these guys are going to be anime’s first real fixture on the Internet, for better or worse. The good news is, you could do a whole lot worse than Blassreiter.

If you like your anime dark and full of action, but without the over-the-top indulgences in sex and violence that Gonzo can be guilty of at times, give it a shot. I think it’s their best “traditional Gonzo” series in a while. And even if you’re just curious, you can jaunt on down to YouTube and check it out for nothing, so why not?

Torawhat?

So here’s what I’ve seen so far, and what I’m thinking.

Casshern SINS.

I was going to bust out the live action flick but I looked at the runtime — almost 2 ½ hours — and remembered it’s long and boring. The visual techniques used in it are good for novelty, but the novelty wears off quick. The first episode of the remake of the remake of the anime, however, is pretty neat.

What did I like? The action was great, the atmosphere of the futuristic sci-fi wasteland is just plain cool, and of course it’s made by Madhouse so it looks great.

Potential problems? The director is mostly known for DBZ, and the futuristic timeline puts our hero firmly in the amnesia seat, and I fucking hate anime-nesia.

Clannad After Story.

Sigh.

What did I like? Animation was good, the humor was in place, the story was a light-hearted introduction built around a very transparent “get all the characters back together” device. Baseball. It looked gross on my TV at SD size.

Potential problems? SPORTS. I felt a little gypped that I watched 22 minutes of baseball.

Kurogane No Linebarrel/Linebarrels of Iron.

After BLASSREITER and Tower of Druaga, I thought Gonzo deserved more of a chance than the average anime blogger gives them. Yeah, BLASSREITER still had a bit of that “we’re for adults, get it?” feel, and it fit well in Gonzo’s business plan: “I have 40 bucks and a computer, let’s relive the 90s!” But it was pretty cool, and some of us would actually like to see more 90s-style anime. Crunchyroll and Gonzo are at it again with this mech series in which a bullied kid gets the power to pilot a mech and hang out with bitches.

What did I like? I was mostly interested in the next episode preview, which hinted at Kouichi’s potential to become a real bastard and use his newfound power for revenge, even if he calls it “justice.” The CG mechs were less overtly “computery” than BLASSREITER’s amalgams, but not quite as neat as Burst Angel’s 3D cartoon look. I see Goro Taniguchi’s name as “creative producer” in the credits, so it pleases me to know that not only did he not quit, he may be lending his powers of insanity to this production. Some of the voice talent is good, including Yuuichi Nakamura, Mamiko Noto as soft-spoken Emi (Raptor scale +1), and the Fruity Menace himself, Jun Fukuyama.

Potential problems? The truckloads of clichés we were delivered in the opening episode really filled up my warehouse of give-a-shit. It’s where Taniguchi and the director (Masamitsu Hidaka of… Pokémon fame…) go from here that will prove make-or-break. Gonzo’s normally interesting and appealing character and mecha designs were nowhere to be seen; I really didn’t enjoy looking at these characters at all. Oh yeah, the big twist of the first episode? Spoil this: Lead character’s already dead. Holy shit, it’s revolutionary! Also, more anime-nesia. Fuck.

Toradora!

Speaking of Shana, I had no intent to watch the newest installment of Rie Kugumiya, Wrathful Loli. But JC Staff, for all their faults, know how to make a series look pretty good, and I’ve already heard quite a few good things going around.

What did I like? Any romance series whose synopsis can start with anything other than “A normal high school boy…” has taken a decent first step. I liked Ryuuichi right off the bat, with his angry eyes and misunderstood personality (Cool & Spicy PLUS). Taiga is already as charming and fun on the whole as Shana was at her most cute. Animation is great, and oddly sometimes it actually resembles one of Gonzo’s better moments.

Potential problems? You can see where the plot is going already — as the two leads help each other with their separate rabu problems, inevitably a romance will start between them. They will of course never touch, never kiss, walk around embarrassed all the time, and possibly be involved in the occasional Nude Misunderstanding. And it will probably just plain suck.

Anybody else watched these? Have anything to add? I can’t wait to try Tytania and Shikabane Hime, provided they get some subtitles.