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Come Lion Tamers, we'll try again to examine another in a long line of anime, trying to earn the viewers' hard earned dollars.

I speak of "Unlimited Fafnir"-2015

Firstly I want to speak a little about certain trends in anime, that all of us recognize when we have the notion forced upon us.

1). Most start in a high-school environment.
2). Most struggles are becoming increasingly supernatural
3). A inordinate number of these things involve a huge number of pretty little girls, with great big childlike eyes, and short skirts, that appear in their early teens, but have the buxom figure of a girl in their late teens, if at ... all.
5). And all the girls tend to have cute little Japanese voices that just make you want to collect the whole set, especially if they get together and hug each other like tiny little girls we wish were actually in the world.

And in some cases all of that fan-service gets so rank, that it interferes with the telling of the story.

Unfortunately, Unlimited Fafnir does not have that problem, because the story is simple enough, anyone can follow it, and almost predict the next move through virtually every one of the story arcs. All of which follow a basic scenario:

1). Monster wants to pair-off with little girl student
2). Little girl becomes the subject of a 'Perils of Pauline' danger zone, and forces everyone, especially our nice-guy hero, to save her, and destroy the monster.
3). Through larger and larger ideas of "...we can do it if we just try harder ...", or the other staple in such stories "... our love will sustain us ..." victory is ours, and we all go home happy and feel all cuddly inside.

Okay, I'm a sucker for a romantic and friendly ending, but this anime uses the basic cliches to the point of irritating me. Which is hard, because anime scenarios tend not to bug me too much, as long as there's a point.

But in the end, I came away with a strong feeling that girls know when they have a good thing, and boys aren't always creeps (unlike some anime). A great relief.
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Let's look at the technicals.

The artwork is above average, with its usual penchant for drawing pretty girls, pretty. And almost every single one of them is drawn very well endowed, many to the point of bouncing off the ground if they fall over. That part is pleasant (not for the girl, I'm just remarking on the possibility of a not-so-funny accident), but I was embarrassed for the artists. And also contains some pretty good 3d parallax aspect-art dealing with tall towers in architecture.

Here's an example of the girls, just an example, we get to see her nude in the first 5-minutes:



The other really bad part was the monsters. All of this type of story has monsters. These are all drawn with really lousy 3D artwork, which turned me off. I would have been much happier without the injected 3D CGI artforms. Dreadful, every last one of them.

Sound. Dialog was read almost uniformly by a whole bunch of cute Japanese Kansai dialog talents. Some of which are so high-pitched they sound like little squirrels; and not in a good way. I would have preferred a little more variation in voicing skills, from one artist to another. Again, this trend had me embarrassed for the artists and the producers. I did not try to watch the dub-english version. Wouldn't have helped at all. The mushy stuff was mushy without dialog, and the dreadful artwork for monsters was going to get no help from English audio. Besides Kansai dialect cuteness has no translation in English (there are anime I prefer in English, this isn't one of them)

Music. The OST is very good, here's a sample. This piece is just plain outstanding, unusual for this kind of fan-service fest:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VYw0RsUrJmA
HTML5
720p MP4
360p MP4

The OP and ED were uninteresting. Not horrible, they just couldn't catch my interest.

Characters. Forgive me for sounding like I'm coughing, but the characters are right out of a filmschool manual. And most of their personalities tend to not fit their character cast designation. On the other hand, the average male viewer won't worry about that. All the young ladies are completely huggable. Bad matches for character against script purposing won't occur to us while we're watching them.
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With all that on the line herein, I must tell you that if you can stand this thing, all the way to the end; you will come off with a set of feelings that are normal for watching little squirrels running around tree-branches in the romantic way that leaves one smiling.

And then you remember some of the less fortunate moments, and the feeling leaves one with that "... what did I just watch? ..."

So, I was going to give this thing a solid 5, but because of some of the OST, I ended up giving Unlimited Fafnir a mild 6.

Sorry folks, it's been one of those weeks. I gotta get away from anime for awhile. I'm becoming too critical of some parts of the whole Anime Genre.

Come Lion Tamers! I have been lucky enough to find one more anime I like!

"A Letter to Momo" - 2011, 2-Hrs.

This is a 2-hour movie of very high quality. For those of you who enjoy anime movies, you're in for a treat!

But first I want to talk about the production as a whole, and mention the production company. I'm amazed how many anime I've watched from this talented company.

'Production I.G.' has made dozens of high quality stories and has contributed to the production of other peoples' works as well. Just a few of the 297 Movies and Series they've been involved with:

Attack on Titan, ... Psycho-Pass, Ghost in the Shell, Usagi Drop, xxxHOLiC, Blood: The Last Vampire; and many others.

The artwork is very flat, with sometimes a slightly enhanced parallax for a great 2.5d effect, the colors are soft, without being muted. Artwork reminds one of Studio Ghibli artwork. The characters seem a bit strange at first, but once you settle in to the style, it begins to become something very special.

The music is not something that stands out, which in this case, is exactly what the company intended. All the music works just fine, seemingly very simple and understated, but at the end of this story, it is the normalcy that stands out and comes through with the heart and and strong feelings that everything else brings to bear.

Dialog, is very strong. The Japanese is excellent, and the Dub-English is also excellent.
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The primary characters are dealt with deftly with nuance and sensitivity. A mother has lost her husband in a ship-sinking. So she sells her condo in Tokyo, and returns with her young daughter, back to the place of her own birth. To find peace, and maybe some healing of wounds. Her old stomping ground is an island just off the coast. The terrain so rugged that the place has been built as a set of huge terraces, to do farming. Still being done since ancient times.

At first, the move is very 'rocky', because our young daughter was used-to Tokyo, and its hustle and bustle. Things get much worse over time, before they get better. Things are just too quiet, where the only fun thing for the daughter to do, is jump off the newly constructed bridge (to the mainland), with the rest of the kids; into shallow water. Most people are elderly, so the kids are few, and some are kinda out-there, as it were. At least as our young lady Momo sees it.

But at some point after settling into the patterns of a slower way of life, things get positively unusual for Momo. Fantasy beings become common place, only to cause nothing but consternation for Momo, and disbelief for her mother. Everything from 'Guardian Oni' to 'Kodoma' (words I normally don't use, but I have to here, since it's a Japanese Anime, with Japanese References everywhere). By the end of the story, they become not only not dangerous, but most of them become her friends so important, that they assist Momo in saving her mothers' Life.
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This is a story of Life, death, rebirth, and renewal of spirit. Of finding our way, and finding sometimes; simplicity is better than complexity. That faith in ourselves, and in our friends, is more important than what 's watchable on television. And sometimes, the courage to be what we have be, to things that saves loved ones, reassure our friends; and make a statement about how the future should end, is the meaning behind the meaning.

'A Letter for Momo' is at first slow, and seems like it goes no-where for the first 30-minutes. But those of you who have the courage to see what is meant, and the tolerance to see a mini-script for real Life, might see what I see, and truly enjoy an outtake for the future of the Human Race.

I give 'A Letter to Momo' a solid 9.

Come, Lion Tamers! Rejoice!

I've found another one worth watching. "Akame Ga Kill!", is a whole lot of great stuff, but first a warning.

Akame Ga Kill! is not for younger viewers, by that I mean nobody should be watching this under the age of 16. This anime deals in notions that are extremely difficult. I mean every word. These notions will be brushed aside, and people will watch this because of the fight scenes. The politics, and meanings in what the authors wish to say; will be lost. Or worse, someone might take these notions to heart, in a situation where the wrong conclusions might be ... arrived at.

Akame Ga Kill! comes under the heading of a 'set piece' cast of characters, with set-piece staged activities and set-piece conclusions. On first glance, the average reader might conclude that I am critical of this anime. But that would be a mistake. I like this anime very much. So let's peel the layers of this story, and see if we can find the reasons for this show.

I think it is advantageous, to get the usual production values out of the way. This will leave more time to talk about the actual story.

1). The music is overall passable, except the opening theme #1. That thing is just noise, and is very unpleasant. None of it is extraordinary though, so don't get too excited by the occasional thematic strain, that soars to the heavens. They are rare, and in this case, add nothing to the story. Some tracks however are very heartfelt, and I like some of the OST very much. Another fine production of Taku Iwasaki. Hear this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNblpHGEXjk&list=PLf-LHQp1nTdxc90yRcR1DK0ZAUIn3uu4v&index=19
HTML5
720p MP4
360p MP4

2). Artwork. The artwork is quite good, although quite flat most of the time. Occasionally, we get a great scene, interspersed with a still-frame showing a hand-drawn set-piece with combatants or something. These moments occur quite often, and add nothing. They are intended to add tension, and possibly a view of a character as an 'alter-ego'; but in general, they fail in that role, and tend to confuse, because these still-frame outtakes are not very good artwork of even the calibre of the rest of the presentation. I could have done quite well without them.

3). Dialog. Dialog is pretty well common and 'by the book', as they say. The other parts of the dialog, sometimes annoyed me, because of the level of overall bravado presented. I realize teenagers are not this cool, and love to hear stuff in dialog they don't have the balls to use in a similar conflict, but most of this kind of dialog is better suited to speeches in material like DBZ (I know many like this anime, but I hate it). The entire show is replete with notions like "... I need more power ...", or "... you can overcome your weakness if you just try hard enough ..." or the ever-popular "... I'm gonna get you sucka! ..."; and that ilk.

These statements are often echo'd in moments where a character (usually a hero) has been beaten by exhaustion that normally would drop a person onto the ground, but somehow we see them redouble their efforts, along the lines of a DBZ scene where the hero stands back up and yells "... KAMEHAMEHA! ...". These moments, and many others, bore me to tears; not to mention irritate me as unrealistic.

"Words Mean Things ..." -Rush Limbaugh

And the notion of exhaustion being a tool for redoubled efforts is kinda lost on me.

A scene from another anime I like "Girls Und Panzer", a tank crew is trying to learn to steer a tank, and the tank commander shouts to the heavens "... Willpower! ...", as if that's going to be helpful in some way. Reading the operating manual would have been much more productive. Just an example.

4). Characters. As I've mentioned before, the characters are mostly 'set-piece', in nature. By that I mean that each is designed to bounce off of the others; in many cases. As if this means they all are going to become friends. And while there IS something to be said for congenial friendships, and the characteristics that can make that happen, many of these characters are thrust together by circumstances that are poor at creating a reason for friendship; from the beginning. After all, risky business often leads to the death of comrades. Making them friends is a bad idea. Most people faced with a war of attrition will shy-off of the notion of making friends of people they may be forced to bury. Especially people they originally disliked in the first place.

Pictures mean things. There are many instances where a Homo Sapien is dismembered. Loss of a limb is a serious threat to Life, Safety and survival. Most Homo Sapiens have approximately 5-6 quarts of blood. Lose 40%, and you start being non-functional and will soon be dead. In one case, a fellow is decapitated at the waist, and is still talking, until he falls down and then finally closes his mouth after several insults are offered in dialog. These characters are tough beyond any semblance of realism, but I suppose that's alright if you like this kind of fantasy.
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Now I can get to the part I like the most. Keep in mind, I have to put aside all the previous commentary, to like this show. Story, for me, is everything. And this show does not disappoint. It begins as a story about a group of people who are doing the early dirty-work, in an effort to pave the way for a rebellion against the evil empire. Literally. The primary character, Tatsumi is inducted against his will, into this den of disrupters, and becomes a loyal combatant.

Their work involves an awful lot of murder, mostly outright scum that need to be gone. I have no problem with that. Even some of the more helpful scum, we often see dealt with in the same way. Necessary to be sure. I'm just warning you, there is a lot of death at the hands of heros and badguys alike.

And like most stories of this kind, we get a lot of hurt feelings of the kind of, from people on both sides "... I'm gonna get you because you took XYZ (valued person) away from me ..." kind of events. Very common, and equally meaningful (or not).

But in the end, we are reduced to talking about Akame Ga Kill! as a political treatise. After all, that's all that's left. This story is mainly about consequences of leadership. Good leadership. Bad leadership.

Good leadership is shown very clearly, in General Najenda. Patient, precise, clever, and inventive. She martials her team as a scalpel, allows time for it to mature and season itself, while refining it from the inside until it is time to drive her team into danger and make the initial attacks upon the corrupt and evil Empire.

Bad leadership is clearly exemplified in the corrupt and evil personal advisor to the pubescent Emperor of the Kingdom, Prime Minister Honest (there's a name for you). He not only allows crime to run rampant, but encourages it, and rewards the very people that others would call criminal and evil. A wonderful way to encourage profit and good feelings in the Empire. Any Empire that functions this way, will steal and murder itself into irrelevance eventually. Even a character named 'Run', makes this point, in the middle of the show.

In the end, nothing is left of the huge cast of this sad tale. Victory is at hand, the Emperor has been guillotined to death. Most of the bad guys have been eliminated. The revolution has been victorious. Only four people, in our set-piece cast remain alive: Wave, Run, Akame and Najenda. Najenda is now important in the new and fledgling government, and because the winners always get to write the history, the friends she knows (all of which were declared enemies of the state only weeks prior) are eliminated from the records. Akame survives and travels as a wandering Ronin. Wave and Run are now officers of the government, wondering how their earlier philosophy will make some kind of "FIT" in the new order of things.

The only winners are the general public. They get a more peaceful and honorable World. They are the only beneficiaries of the conflicts, brought about by two groups of combatants that have unreconcilable differences.

Even Esdeath, the senior General of the Empire, a person who's entire claim to ethics resides in her fantastic decision to have a male companion, choosing one of our male heros, Tatsumi. She even has a strong unquenchable desire to protect him from harm, regardless. This remains true, even after she realizes that he is one of the enemy. That of course is the means by which the authors try to make of her, somehow more Human. This falls very flat, as she describes the murder, torture and decimation of thousands of the enemy; after the battle is won; "The only way to make sure the battle will not return, and ensures the loyalty of my troops and the new leaders I install".

She is so despicable, that she isn't even loyal to her employers. She is only loyal to the notion of being a general of an army. Give her an army, and pay her enough, and she'll destroy anybody's enemies. Maybe the Revolutionary Army should have bribed her to join them? On the other hand, after peace, how would you stop her from picking a fight, later? With everybody, in the name of her favorite hobby. War, and the waging of it. She even speaks of that potential.
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And so readers, I end this review of a mixed bag, with some good ethical references; and great characters. And the missing of most of them; as most die at the end of the tale. They miss each other, as each of their fellows are buried. And the viewer ends up missing some of them as well. The authors present so many, that all viewers will tend to attach themselves to at least one of them.

I debated giving Akame Ga Kill! a 9, but because of some of the poorly executed production values, and the attempt to apply moral values to characters without redemption; I decided on a weak 8.

Okay Lion Tamers. Long time until now, 'cause I finally found one I like!

'Ookami to Koushinryou II', also known as 'Spice and Wolf'; is a new take on the traveling duo story. At least in a mechanical sense.

Under the hood of this story is a true romance, involving two completely different species of creatures. The story even has dialog, from time to time to make that case.

And, as many will point out, there is a lot of dialog. In the anime's defense tho, I would much rather have a lot of good dialog, than one line of the wrong kind of dialog.

So let's take a ... look at this thing, in a little more depth.
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1). The artwork is absolutely stunning. There are almost no anime that shows docked ships, in a rolling coastal sea, bobbing in the water. This show does this in almost 3d splendor. It is gorgeous and should not be missed. And it's not the only example of high-quality artwork.

You will find incredible motion art in many places, that defy description. For instance, how many anime show a heartfelt handshake, showing all the artwork, with individually articulated fingers? Very few. And this kind of thing is what makes the artwork stand out.

My only criticism, is the same as many other reviews I've made; does the Wolf character have to have bright Red Eyes? No living wolf in nature has red eyes, and it isn't necessary to make the case of this supernatural form of wolf. Sheesh.

Yahoo reports this: Best Answer: A wolf's eyes may be brown, orange, yellow or pale green...

2). Music is actually quite good. While I don't wish to own the soundtrack, the music was artful and appropriate to the shows' atmosphere. Three cheers for the authors not going for the J-Pop only meme.

3). Dialog was mainly driven by the events within the context of the character activities. As well they should be, and almost never happens with any accuracy, in other anime.

4). Romance! And lots of it. While I'm not a huge fan of romantic anime, in this particular case, 'Ookami to Koushinryou II' carries this out properly, with tenderness, comedy where appropriate, and subtleties rarely found in other anime.

For clarification, I become too often tired of comments involving the notion that if there is no sex in the story, then romance is not present. This is a naive notion, that requires adult maturity to understand with clarity. For those of you who don't understand this point; many of us, that have some age on us, often have romantic friendships with the opposite sex, that might continue for decades. Neither one of those people ever have the thought that sex is necessary to continue this romantic and fun relationship. That's not stupid; the thought that this cannot function is stupid.

And that is the proper and correct tack, in Spice and Wolf. They make this case, eminently clear. Besides, common sense would tell you that it is probably not possible for biological events following from a sexual relationship between a Human and a creature that exists only in fairly tales, lives almost forever, and rarely has anything to do socially, with Humans. Especially a female Wolf that has already eaten Humans for survival, and reveals this point in the dialog.

5). My main criticism for this season-2 of the anime, is a breach in the story line.
The last arc of this story is heavily flawed. Wolf goes to great lengths, through two entire seasons to make a case that she is intelligent, independent, and insists on being a free-spirit. Only to give it all away to support a plan to place her in Slavery-Bondage. Something in which the story has her undying support for. This becomes a rational non-sequitur. She would never do this, for any reason, not even for temporary reasons. It's not something she would be able to tolerate. But there it is in the second season. It's a very large and repulsive breach, and I need to clarify by mentioning it in this review.

Again, it is a serious story flaw, but I can get over it, as the rest of the season continues to hold up as a much recommended anime.
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If you like a great travelers anime, and want to see a Wolf in Human form, that actually does not act very Human; then this may be your anime. For those with the knowledge, and experience to understand it; Spice and Wolf might be your anime as well.

I give it a clean and solid 9!

Okay Lion Tamers. Long time until now, 'cause I finally found one I like!

'Ookami to Koushinryou', also known as 'Spice and Wolf'; is a new take on the traveling duo story. At least in a mechanical sense.

Under the hood of this story is a true romance, involving two completely different species of creatures. The story even has dialog, from time to time to make that case.

And, as many will point out, there is a lot of dialog. In the anime's defense tho, I would much rather have a lot of good dialog, than one line of the wrong kind of dialog.

So let's take a look ... at this thing, in a little more depth.
-------------------
1). The artwork is absolutely stunning. There are almost no anime that shows docked ships, in a rolling coastal sea, bobbing in the water. This show does this in almost 3d splendor. It is gorgeous and should not be missed. And it's not the only example of high-quality artwork.

You will find incredible motion art in many places, that defy description. For instance, how many anime show a heartfelt handshake, showing all the artwork, with individually articulated fingers? Very few. And this kind of thing is what makes the artwork stand out.

My only criticism, is the same as many other reviews I've made; does the Wolf character have to have bright Red Eyes? No living wolf in nature has red eyes, and it isn't necessary to make the case of this supernatural form of wolf. Sheesh.

Yahoo reports this: Best Answer: A wolf's eyes may be brown, orange, yellow or pale green...

2). Music is actually quite good. While I don't wish to own the soundtrack, the music was artful and appropriate to the shows' atmosphere. Three cheers for the authors not going for the J-Pop only meme.

3). Dialog was mainly driven by the events within the context of the character activities. As well they should be, and almost never happens with any accuracy, in other anime.

4). Romance! And lots of it. While I'm not a huge fan of romantic anime, in this particular case, Ookami to Koushinryou carries this out properly, with tenderness, comedy where appropriate, and subtleties rarely found in other anime.

For clarification, I become too often tired of comments involving the notion that if there is no sex in the story, then romance is not present. This is a naive notion, that requires adult maturity to understand with clarity. For those of you who don't understand this point; many of us, that have some age on us, often have romantic friendships with the opposite sex, that might continue for decades. Neither one of those people ever have the thought that sex is necessary to continue this romantic and fun relationship. That's not stupid; the thought that this cannot function is stupid.

And that is the proper and correct tack, in Spice and Wolf. They make this case, eminently clear. Besides, common sense would tell you that it is probably not possible for biological events following from a sexual relationship between a Human and a creature that exists only in fairly tales, lives almost forever, and rarely has anything to do socially, with Humans. Especially a female Wolf that has already eaten Humans for survival, and reveals this point in the dialog.
-----------------------

If you like a great travelers anime, and want to see a Wolf in Human form, that actually does not act very Human; then this may be your anime. For those with the knowledge, and experience to understand it; Spice and Wolf might be your anime as well.

I give it a clean and solid 9!

Okay, Lion Tamers. We try again to like an anime.

"Kemeko Deluxe!", is a huge disappointment.

The characters are worthless, and pointless (in that I mean they never make a point, and never get to a point).

Very few of the characters even know how to kiss there opposite gender (and I include almost all the girls) The only girl with the character strength to actually follow through on romantic feelings is the female villain (Vanilla Make Repairs [there is four or five of these kinds of names in the show, all loony and inappropriate])). She never gets the time, and Sanpeita Kobayashi is running away from her ... all the time, for lots of good reasons.

Vanilla Make Repairs is as nuts as the authors. Her character is criminally insane, and tends to say sexy and inviting things while ordering the demise of her true love interest. Or anyone else that might suspect the real perpetrator of evil. I leave the viewer to figure that out. I think the death of Mei's father was an accident, that would, under tight scrutiny, finger Vanilla Make repairs. That would explain her desire to eliminate everyone that gets in her way, mainly Mei Mishima.

The story almost reaches the threshold of something that might grab my interest, and then the show ends at episode 12, leaving the story unfinished; and much of it stays missing, unexplained, and damaged beyond repair.

The authors need their lithium gas treatments increased. The entire story, character development, and most of the music; were written by insane people that need to be institutionalized. I mean by that, the authors and story creators are insane beyond redemption.

The entire show is trying for humor laced through an insane storyline. The authors think this sort of thing is funny. No funny here. Not even a chuckle. The entire library of potential jokes fall flat. It is not pornography, but it runs right up to the line and stops because of story incompetence. Then again, competence would have allowed for fully developed and bittersweet romance. But even that was blown away by totally insane writing, at every level.

I realize this review stands as one of my shortest. But there it is, the least interesting near miss, I've ever seen in anime.
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I can recommend this anime for only one item, and only one. The opening title song is fresh, engaging and truly excellent. It is a pleasure to run into the only bebop rhythm tune in anime. And it is superb.

I leave this broken, poorly written, and lack of detailed; anime with a score of 4.

And my God have mercy on its lack of soul.

Lion Tamers, Lion Tamers; gather round!

I take a look at another of many stories dealing with super powers, and school environments. This one with many interesting twists.

I speak of course, about "Absolute Duo".

As some of you know, I begin to tire of the almost absolute nature of Japanese authors, that believe all anime (or manga, for that matter) must begin with a high-school environment. But I'm not going to rant about that. For me, basic story is everything; so the startup environment becomes a small gripe, but a gripe nonetheless.

I have been very late in reviewing this anime, because firstly, I've been very busy writing ... some fan fiction. But also, because I wanted to watch the show again, in English Dub. The first time I watched it was in the Japanese with subtitles. I can report that the subtitled version is much better. The chosen English voices (aside from Caitlin Glass) were mostly mediocre to terrible.
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To that end, I wish to speak a little about Caitlin Glass. Ms. Glass was born in D.C., and raised in California. She presently lives in Texas. Caitlin Glass isn't right for every character she plays; but in this case, she was so over the top, that I just had to mention the great outrageous character voice she did for the character Lilith Bristol, supposedly a very English personality.

Arrogant, spoiled, patrician; Caitlin Glass faked everything Lilith had to be with charm, grace and fun. Lilith Bristol was so over the top that everything she said and did, had comic overtones that just had me grinning, in every scene she was in. One misses out on Caitlin's voice, for the overall much better subtitled version, but if you want to be charmed by a dubbed voice look for Lilith Bristol. You won't be disappointed.

Caitlin Glass is often caught doing a lot of things one would not expect. She was the ADR Director of this show; and she is heard in other anime. The one that comes to mind is a song she sings, with many other characters in "Cat Planet Cuties", where she is the best sounding. Her character sings this song, where her character is an Android that is keeping faith with her previous owner, now dead for more than 900-years. After that, her character travels back to home world, and pitches herself into the ocean, in the commission of suicide. She just couldn't bear to live anymore. Anyone who can't feel pathos about that, has had his/her pathos button burned out.
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Let's now return to Absolute Duo.

Since most of the characters are quite formulaic, I only wish to speak about one or two, in the main. And that begins with Kevin Wayfair.

Kevin Wayfair is a total abomination. His back story does not fit his character. His brother dies, in ways not detailed in the story, so he reacts by believing in nothing and no-one. He becomes the penultimate villain character, with only a one-dimensional face on everything, including his universally single-minded desire to kill anything that becomes a possible threat; in his single-minded drive to become the strongest power center. He doesn't even have an over-arching reason to acquire power, and applies it to nothing but the acquisition of more of it.

Lot's of people lose their brothers. They don't become homicidal maniacs. They usually get over it, and live normal lives. Even in the Absolute Duo universe, where several characters have lost loved ones. They didn't become insane monsters. Difficult to handle sometimes, but not irretrievably insane.

Now I want to speak briefly about one of the teachers in our hero's homeroom; Rito Tsukimi. For those of you who have watched part or all of Absolute Duo; you'll already know. Rito is 'bang her head against the wall because it feels good' totally nuts. Couple homicidal rage with latent nymphomania, and you get pretty close to this teacher with the playboy bunny ears and a personality Marquis De Sade would have been proud of. And this is what the head-mistress of the school allows near young teenagers.

The other side of Rito's equation is that without her, there would have been very little humor in the show, albeit dark sadistic humor. She, with great cheer and aplomb, sometimes decides to include herself in the occasional scheduled combat matches, just to introduce what she thinks is funny. This amounts to converting these matches into death-matches a'la Freddy Kruger. That's reasonably funny too, if you're into that sort of thing.

It would not have been difficult to edit a few plot-lines, or dialog, to make Rito an 'insider' spy for Kevin Wayfair. But that doesn't happen, she is totally loyal to her head-mistress of the school. No reason I can come up with, and it isn't in the story. Don't look for it, just enjoy that somehow Rito is on the side of 'good and righteousness'.

Now I wish to switch gears and talk about the plot. Because of the single-sided villain in the story, there isn't much for the authors to develop. But they did have some mildly good plot devices in the story that I could enjoy.

1). Did anyone notice that this school has enemies that are not a competing club in the school, or other inside faction? The enemies are all external from the main campus of the school, and thereby produces a story plot that is significantly different from most other high-school 'spice of life' adversarial conflicts.

2). Does anyone notice that the head-mistress of this school is not running a school at all, but a factory for super-humans? This explains why she runs two separate campuses. And because of this developing plot-line, she has absolutely no compassion for her students at all. Sakuya Tsukomo is however, a very good politician, and knows when she must appear compassionate when politic to do so. For this reason, many respect her, but she has almost no friends at all. Is it any wonder her handle is 'Blaze Diabolica'?

Sakuya is so dark, that she could almost be classed as a true anti-villain. In the end I had real trouble with her absolute refusal to join forces with the other character that has no back-story. Equipment Smith. I see no reason why not. Exo-suit equipment for augmenting the physical strength of a Blaze Student would in fact produce a pair of 'Absolute Duo', in a much shorter time. The results were all positive, I could not see a negative to this alliance.

In short, Sakuya was a very guarded and secretive individual, for reasons difficult to defend. Equipment Smith's main failings dealt with poor choices for personnel to be augmented. The means of augmentation had few negatives.

3). Did anyone notice that 'Miyabi Hotaka" was never defeated at the end? She got talked out of her desire to be powerful beyond all imagining. Plain and simple. This produced a very unsatisfying ending. Without that moment in the story, the pairing of Miyabi and Kevin would have been demonstrably stronger than the 'Blaze' alone. And head-mistess Sakuya would have met with defeat. She won because of a weak-minded fool who should never have been augmented in the first place. And Kevin was an equally poor choice for augmentation, for opposite reasons.

In this way, the authors provide for us a straw-man, that looks like the whole idea of augmentation is a poor one. It isn't. Only the choice of people was flawed. For example, a sane man with a gun does not shoot up his neighborhood, just because he can. Only a flawed one would even consider it.
---------------------
Now I want to talk about the art and sound in the show. The artwork is actually quite good, and even contains some startling parallax artwork and other niceties. But I continue to question the use of eye-colors in the metallic range. It makes the characters look like dead automatons. I wish artists would refrain from this practice. It tarnishes otherwise good artwork.

The soundtrack is quite good, although there isn't a whole bunch of it. The opening and closing title music is mostly very bad j-pop music. The exception is the first end-title track, which is very good, and its harmonies and rhythm is not too egregious.

The dialog tends towards too much, but not to the point of extreme annoyance; aside from Rito's dialog which tends to say too much, and give away her characteristics too early in the story.

With all of that, I close a review of a very flawed anime in 'Absolute Duo', which did in fact have some good developmental plot points, and some excellent actions scenes. Oh and don't forget the rare and interesting, although poorly developed characters that bear watching; Like Diabolica and Rito. And the never speaking character 'Ryuutarou Tatsuno' who flexes his muscles to impress the girls, and gets his over-muscled physique stomped into the pavement way more often than he should have.

I give Absolute Duo a weak 7.

All right Lion Tamers. We look at another anime. This time, I found one I actually like.

It's called "Dungeon ni Deai wo Motomeru no wa Machigatteiru Darou ka", what a mouthful! Translation is 'Dzun-ge would be wrong I'll seek a meeting to sound day', I swear that's the Google Translation.

There is a short name some use "DanMachi", don't ask me I have no idea. Google Translation is 'Dan-Machi'.

A lot of the time; most of us get caught up in the story, or the music, or the dialog, or the artwork, or the characters.

But then there is the forest, hiding in all those trees. And ... DanMachi is one of these shows, that shows us that sometimes the forest is more important than the trees.

***

I'll discuss the Anime's specifics in a moment, but I want to have a word about the meanings of things. Sometimes Anime has a meaning that shines far above the actual artwork. DanMachi is one of those rare shining lights.

For once, we have a show that stands up and shouts to the highest mountaintops.

That our faith in our fellow Man, is more important than the impending threats, the suffering that is a consequence of standing up for our friends, and loved ones. That courage in the face of enemies, in the defense of our true friends and loved ones, speaks louder than any fear.

And the fact that no one else sees it, isn't the same as if it never happened at all. Things that are important in our life, are not, unless we are willing to suffer to protect them. Things that are important, has nothing to do with the property we own, or the school we go to, or the stores we frequent.

The valuable things are those items we carry with us for our entire lives, that enrichen it, and make the days we live in the future, seem richer for knowing those things.

All of that leads us to DanMachi, and a little fellow that would not surrender his belief for temporary freedom from fear and pain. And because he stood up and fought to protect what he held dear, his faith in the strength of the friendship and love of his fellows; his fellows responded in kind.

In other words, those things many would find a weakness in his character, was exactly the forces martial'd, to bring about the friendships he gained. These friendships and loved ones were a direct consequence of his behavior. All of these people that centered upon him, as a compass point; were not there to form a harem, or a club. They are friends and neighbors, their behavior paid for, by his offering his spirit of neighborhood to his fellows.

First.

The spirit of neighborhood, and fellowship are not weakness; they are an enormous strength. When we forget that, we give a heave-ho to our own lives within the context of our own way of life, without safety, without friends, without community. But most of all, our neighborhoods become embattled contests for survival, and the grace of a civilized culture is the victim.

Bell has two character traits that are all to rare in the description of a male hero: charity, and mercy. He gave of himself, in the name of his friends, and they became his neighbors. What is a neighbor, but a person who stands with you, when your sense of community is threatened?

What does it mean to be Human? Does it mean we are all born Human? I don't believe that. Being Human is to decide to operate by set of principles that define what it is to be Human. Being a Human Being has nothing to do with biology, or procreation, or how we look. It is defined by how we believe we should behave among our fellow Humans.

The fact that many try to gain our faith in themselves, as if all Men deserve to be trusted as if we were all Human, is a deceit of the highest order, a con-game. Especially when non-Human Homo-Sapiens walk among us trying to get the results of these values from us, without trading in kind. These are liars, cheats and thieves.

Is it any wonder that the motto of the U.S. Air Force Academy is "I shall not lie, cheat or steal; or tolerate anyone who does."? Those who do, don't stay at the Academy long.

The little female character, Miss Arde, is a case in point. She had been beaten, kicked, dropped into terror, mistreated in so many ways; that she had lost her faith in her fellow Man. But just as in real life, it only took one true faithful spirit to teach her that not everyone had to live as she had. She realized what she was doing wasn't living; she had sold her soul to pay for existence.

And because of it, she mistrusted Bell's motives, even to betraying him because he was an easy mark. True Humans usually are. Until Miss Arde realized that it was the very things she thought of as weaknesses, that were the very causes for Bell's decisions to defend her when she least expected it.

Weakness? Lost promises? Can't relate to people of the same stripe? I don't think so. Bell is a symbol of all that is good in Man, and needs to be nurtured for its own sake.

***

Now I can talk about the basic production of DanMachi.

This anime has a wonderful story, that covers an enormous amount of back-story and premise in 13-episodes. I would have appreciated more episodes, to give more depth of history, but this Anime was adequate in this regard, for what was offered.

The artwork was very good, even having some parallax artwork in moments where Bell or some other characters are walking down a street, or images of large panoramas are described. This is 'J.C. Staff' at its finest.

The music was, for once, something I could sink my teeth into. Catchy tunes, with fine melodies. Singing that is worthy of the name. Harmonies that work together with the voices, to make something that is pleasant to hear. While I would have preferred to have music that also had import to the show itself, after all, we are dealing with an alternate universe, with Gods who walk among the ordinary gentry. And the basic soundtrack was also appropriate to the moments in the story.

The characters were interesting, each one a three-dimensional personality. Even the girls were varied, and while they tended to be way to cute for real life; still all bounced off each other (no pun intended) as people would in a real town, with real neighborhoods. There is nothing unusual about a girl finding herself interested in a boy who has a history of treating other people with dignity and respect. And this happened quite a few times. Rare? Never. Many girls become women who marry such boys, who grow up to be good men.

The only thing that began to not jive very well is that even though the beginnings of the tale centers on a little God named Hestia, who pairs herself with her one and only Adventurer, in an old deserted non-Greek-God Worship Church; as they developed in their community, and became somewhat richer, they stayed in the rent-free squatters life-style. Never to be improved upon, as they could afford more and better. Everything in their lives were old, hand-me-down and discarded by every one. Including the building itself.

One has to wonder about that. And then there's the debt to be paid, by Hestia, for the knife Hephaistios created for Bell. But these items are for another season. If there ever is another one. This show is one of those that deserves another season. After all, we still don't have a motivation for the actions of Freya. This is not a weakness, it just needs some more episodes, to place Freya on center stage. Something that was never done, in the interests of developing the rest of the plot. This is not an error. It is an author's license.

With all of the above, I finish this review of a short, flawed, but otherwise excellent offering. Slickly written, with comedy, pathos, heartfelt emotions; and a soaring set of principles that is all too rare.

I give DanMachi a solid 9!

Lion Tamers, Lion Tamers; let's put on on our Clive Beaty Safari Hat (we'll need it) and carry a chair and a whip. These accouterments will be necessary to prevent certain special effects from infecting and spoiling our cloths; and our self-respect.

The anime we will examine is "Oreshura", which I will use to name it in the future.

That long Japanese monster of a title, while accurate; doesn't say anything to anyone, except a die-hard english speaking Japanese language enthusiast. A true Japanese person would have trouble explaining what that monster of a title means, to anyone but another Japanese national.

I even tried to get a ... direct translation of "Ore no kanojo to osananajimi ga shuraba sugiru", which gave me "My Girlfriend and Childhood Friend Fight Too Much". After receiving this translation, I just sat for five minutes, dumbfounded; that a title as innocuous as that, actually was important enough to produce an Anime of 13-chapters.

But I digress. Oreshura translates to "I Shura". Which means the original long-monster title means something I don't care about, and the newer short title means absolutely nothing. "Shura" is not a 'person, place, or thing' in this Anime. If you are confused by all this, you can imagine how confused I was about this.
------------------

But let's try to get into the Anime itself.

1). Firstly, let's give a way a plot point, as a means of disassembling a non-sequitor. While there is an argument between our main character fellows' girlfriend and his childhood friend, this happens so rarely in the Anime, that the title isn't anywhere near the mark. A closer title would have been; "The Lion, The witch, and the Wardrobe". Oops!? I can't use that, it's already taken by a live-action movie. Drat!

2). The girlfriend. while the show goes to great lengths to point out that our two protagonists are not interested in ordinary puppy love, but instead are just trying to create a situation where both (but mainly the female) can avoid further dating requests and the usual behind the scenes comments from fellow classmates that just happen to like these two peoples' looks. And we find that some comments are made snidely, and presented by people that aren't happy about anything.

Now let's look deeper. This Anime had a real chance to take this story into a real character based mystery and blew it. The whole reason of the female 'Mazusu' wanting to leave all that running and jumping behind, was not the constant approaches, but paranoia developed after total insanity came about while living with her father. Her father then decided she needed a change of scene, and sent her from Sweden to Japan, on the condition that she would be reported on, by her own sister, to their mutual father.

Father had brought about a situation that forced his wife, their mother, to leave, never to return; leaving the two daughters to the fathers' tender mercies. The narrative stops very suddenly, and we are never allowed to see the rest of the reasons for the tortured soul that is Mazusa.

All the above is in the Anime, and I'm told, elaborated upon slightly, in the Light Novel.

Is she sane? No. Is she dangerous? No. Is she a conniving little rat, that uses her obvious physical allure to get what she wants? Yes! Should she be able to do this at the tender age of fifteen? Absolutely not! But she does. And the unfinished back-story to her character could have easily shown us a reason for this criminal but precocious behavior.

And thereby hangs my objection to these goings on. We had a right to know how this personality evolved into the Mazusa we see in this Anime. Without that explanation, the whole story becomes weak and unsatisfying. Without it, the conflicts Mazusa creates with her rivals, becomes unnecessary. Mazusa connives in ways unusual, even for an adult of training, in the misleading of assailants (such as an espionage agent) for reasons that are unclear.

She offsets blame, by using blackmail against her own partner. That stress leads to confusions of meaning between the person blackmailed and other females in his social circle. She uses temporal doubts, to allow her to be absent, when she promises to be places, and then complains when her partner does not get that she is playing a ruse. In other words, she assumes her beau is just as criminally clever as she is, and gets mad when he can't see the future, as a consequence of her thinking, while she leaves him out of the planning.

Does she evolve as a personality? Slightly, but not in any way that means she won't do any of this stuff again. She even jokes about that possibility in the last episode, while laying on top of her fake beau, which of course confuses him. She is sexually adept in ways that he is not ready for, at his age. It becomes obvious that while she offers sex to him, in a philosophical way, she has no intention of actually carrying it out. Even though most of his other female friends would have no trouble completing sex with him.

Which gives us another reason to want to know what the hell the completed back story has in it, that creates this conundrum. A psychologist would probably be able to get pretty close. I'm gonna just pass something out there, and hope I get close. I'm so distressed that the story in Oreshura is so weak, that I have to offer an alternative plot that fits the conditions of the present story line, while giving us a much stronger and edgy'r product.

What if the heavily dominated and controlled Mazusa was raped by her father?

It explains his desire to place rigid and very strange controls on her, to the extent that her sanity finally cracked, and she ended up in a sanitarium for awhile "trying to please daddy". It would explain why her mother left in disgust, and was chased out of this home, in order to prevent her from creating an escape for their eldest daughter; and silence her in political ways. The wealth displayed is enormous. What if daddy is a politician? It explains why Mazusa's younger sister reports on Mazusa in a conspiracy against daddy.

But most of all, it begins to give us an explanation for Mazusa's extreme and weird behavior, especially regarding her relations with boys her own age. It explains the social competence, while also givings us a cause for the desire to feel the air between her legs. She has this thing about wandering around with nothing under her skirt.
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I place the above, as a reason to have doubts about the competence of the authors. They had a chance to make this into a true horror story, that begins as a rom/com, and ends in a tragic horror story that would have raised the hackles of everyone who watches, while never getting all the way to Hentai Anime. It might have started a new genre. But the opportunity was blown, while all the plot points are present, to try again, and make something great! And that being said, by me. A person that doesn't like horror stories, in the main.

Because the plot is watered down, the dialog is very weak most of the time. The soundtrack is adequate, but not memorable. The opening and closing music is something I hate, which is J-pop, played fast, and in the process; creates a singing voice that sounds like a squirrel being strangled. A pity, as the singers are all people that are respected voice actors. The video and cartooning is a bit weak, as it is all done in fuzzy pastels (not a resolution problem, it's intentional); to make the scenes appear mildly romantic, even when the situations are anything else.

And so I close this review, of a story with massive potential, never realized. A watered down mess, that ends with the viewer wanting to know what the future holds for our young fellow and his 4-female friends. And then their's his aunt, that told him outright, she wished he would chase her around the coffee table too. Another entire story arc, missed entirely.

I give Oreshura a weak 6.

Lion Tamers! We try again to like another harem anime.

I managed to marathon all 12 episodes in less than 2-days, which was fairly easy, because then I skipped most of the opening music, and closing music. All of which was really not very good. I even went against my own principles in marathoning the show, just to try to find good things about the show.

As some of you know, I dislike j-pop hi-speed rhythm music. While theses musical pieces were made to sound reminiscent of "Unbreakable Machine Doll' the end product was not anywhere near as memorable. The singer for the opening theme song, was ... quite good, and I felt sorry for her; as she was stuck trying to make something out of a song played more than twice as fast as necessary.

There was actually a tune, and almost had some noticeable harmonies there, but most of the things I was willing to like about the songs, was hidden in all the screaming guitars, and hi-speed playback. It almost felt like the music composers and arrangers had it in their minds to hide the good parts intentionally. Oh well, these people that annoyed me, and my musical sensibilities should be horsewhipped, but I'm killing too much time already in talking about the unmemorable music.

I DID however like the soundtrack sounds and musical riffs. Not bad at all. There! I said it. Something good about the show.

***

Now I want to talk about the Story. I will save the characters for last. I know, that's backwards, even for me, but there's some bass-ackwards stuff in this anime anyways. And I'll get to that too.

This story does have a few items that are clearly innovative. But the plot I wanted to see was the one they hinted at thru the whole anime, and we never got to see it. And we never will. Don'tcha just hate that? We'll get to that, but let's get to the main story.

Okay, I'm not gonna get into a lot of story specifics, but I do want to mention a few basic ideas from the plotline, in passing, that I found interesting. Careful about the phrase "May you live in interesting times. " This was an old Roman curse. So careful what you wish for.

Anyhow, we have a inter-dimensional rift story here, where people from other places come into a second place (always the same first destination), chase girls, sometimes even a queen or a princess or two (most of the new arrivals are male Americans, I love that (grin)), then they get bored and go home. No apparent offspring launched out at me as a viewer. So all is fun and games.

And oh yea, when you're in this other land, you have to learn weird old english, in the floweriest of terms. If you don't speak as they do, they turn to their fellows and say things like; "Avast, hast thy knave lost his reason, or mayhaps he is a stranger!" Which of course confuses our visitor, and in the case of our main character, prompts hm to bash a fellow in the face, or strip a girl from her undies.

Which they would not have been wearing in such a backward culture anyway. People tended to be, in past eras, let's see, how do I put this; oh yea, Rita Rudner had a great phrase "... Naked under my cloths ..." Undies were not present, even for rich people. But without the undies, we would have lost more than half of the fan-service. Which I like, as long as people don't get hurt from it, or gets in the way of telling the story. Which happens in this story. A lot!!!

Let's describe the culture as best we can. I counted a lot of women in this show. And some fellows, but mostly women. After all, if one expects to have harems in any culture, you would want a culture that contains sufficient women that most men who want a harem can have one. Right?

And not one of these women can be over the age of 22, and none of them can be fat, and they can only be flat-chested if they are under the age of 14. And the male population are inconsiderate bastards, almost uniformly; which these females mostly go head over heals over. Cool! There's reality for yah!

Both worlds, Earth (maybe, just a guess) and this other place, operate in the above fashion, although the Earth demographic seems to be slightly more balanced. But not by much, barely noticeable.

Look folks, I like a little fantasy as much as the next fellow, but this is stretching a lot of my ability to suspend disbelief.

***

Now I wanna talk about dialog. I like good dialog. But I have to say, when the male hero is talking his future girlfriend out of committing suicide, it is a good idea to keep one eye on that giant ***Dragon*** trying to fry you two to atoms. This is exactly what happened in one of many scenes, which began to resemble a Shakespearian rendition of Hamlet;

"Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio: a fellow
of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy: he hath
borne me on his back a thousand times; and now, how
abhorred in my imagination it is! my gorge rims at
it. Here hung those lips that I have kissed I know
not how oft. Where be your gibes now? your
gambols? your songs? your flashes of merriment,
that were wont to set the table on a roar? Not one
now, to mock your own grinning? quite chap-fallen?
Now get you to my lady's chamber, and tell her, let
her paint an inch thick, to this favour she must
come; make her laugh at that. Prithee, Horatio, tell
me one thing."

Meaning, in not to make too much a point on it, there was too much dialog, in about half the episodes. And the dialog was irrationally placed at points, where large speeches got in the way of timely and pressing events. Like big fights, or strong conflicted differences of opinion.

***

And now I get to the characters and their juxtaposition. What we have here is a form of double reversal of roles here.

The male lead is Goku, from DBZ. I realize that is very brief, but there is literally nothing else. He even glows in the dark like Goku when he gets really, really annoyed. He postures like Goku. He has the bravado of Goku. He even yells often about needing 'more power' or the lack of it, and makes insinuations that imply that it would be nice if he could strangle his opponent to death, it would make him quite happy, like Goku.

The female lead, playing his non-related sister from the other world, plays a meek and mild little person, that before the end of the show grows into a person who isn't bashful about anything (she gets her fear muscle completely burned out of her by the events of the anime).

Meanwhile, this little cutie is the biggest chested girl in the anime, of course; and shapely, quite pretty and has a nice little sweet name "Miu". Sounds like the cutest little lap-kitten on the face of the earth. And she becomes this little piece of heaven, as the show runs along.

Mind you, she is the daughter of the nastiest Dark Lord and King of the dark and putrified forests of the other place. Yep, she's just gonna be sweetness and light, upon everybody she meets. I believe, I believe; yes I believe I will have another piece of pie. The authors have GOT to be kidding me.

We have a lesbian girl who attempts rape of at least one girl in the locker room of their school, and everybody is just fine with that. Putting aside she's lesbian, that's still unwanted physical assault. Lemme try that again. That is unwanted physical assault. And should have gotten her expelled and jailed. If a fella had done that in the show, he would have had a wonderful view out his window at the graybar hotel.

We have an entire student body government that behaves like the Nazi High Command. And that never changes through the whole anime, even when they begin to see reason. They're still rude, officious, crass, and generally ill mannered. Oh yea, I fergot. They lean towards dumb as lawn fertilizer, eventually taking all their productive leads from our main hero, with strong misgivings, and still blaming him for everything.

****

Were there things I liked? Yep! I liked that Miu was is a lovely sweet girl that can be talked into anything, because she trusts. A rare and pleasant characteristic. I didn't believe it for one second, but it was cute.

I liked the artwork, most of which was the stuff which has become standard fair from Funimation, Lantis, etc.

I liked that our crass and irritating super hero from the funny-farm does actually feel some responsibility for his actions. It's hard to find, and he wrecks havok upon all observers, including his own friends, by doing something really, really thoughtless. A lot! But if he wasn't that lovable guy we have known and enjoyed, hell most of that fan-service would never have got off the ground.

Oh! I almost left out a complete thought. Shame on me. The hinted at subplot is the one I wanted to see. Not more of. It should have been the material for the entire main plot, and now requires a second season to actually do anything about. Which we will never get.

That plot is the hinted at Star-Chamber, operated by Kyouya Hikami, a very potentially mean element, and subplotted again by Motoharu Kaitou. Ostensibly these characters and others, are involved in silencing opposition to stable governments all over the world, via the use of their superior super-magic. The sub-text is one of domination of lesser mages, and the destruction of all forces that would contest their power.

But we don't get to see that. And as I've said, we won't either. Oh well, nuts.

I give "Hagure Yuusha no Aesthetica" a strong 6.