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(this review will be for the English version, Transformers Armada. There are some dialogue differences between the English version and the Japanese version, Micron Legend).

Transformers Armada is the first of the Unicron Trilogy, a series plagued by animation errors and dubbing errors, among other things. Although not as badly hit as Energon, Armada still suffers a lot of these and it prevents fans from watching or enjoying the show.

But is this show any good? Let's find out.

Story: At first the story starts slow, I'll admit that. A small team of Autobots and Decepticons land on Earth, in a race to capture Minicons, small transformers that ... can enhance the power of a large transformer and turn the tide in a battle. However once new characters are introduced-especially the enigmatic Sideways-it becomes clear that there is more at stake in this war than just control over the Minicons. Midway the story becomes better, and the 3rd part of the series is definitely the best part.

Animation/Dubbing: Oh dear... where do we start. Frankly, animation is bad. Armada is animated by Actas, and you can tell what a rush job this is. Animation errors abound in this series, including a scene where jet-mode Starscream is represented by a flying black dot. Yeah. There are also lots of mistakes in the dubbing. Calling characters by their Japanese names (for example, calling Tidal Wave Shockwave) or giving the wrong name to a character (Sparkplug, Optimus's Minicon, is almost always called Leader-1). Animation and dubbing is clearly the low point of this series.

Characters: First of all, the human characters. Yes, they're annoying, and for the most part, useless. But I hope that you learn to tolerate them, since they're here to stay. The Autobot and Decepticon teams are better; they all have different personalities, from the battle-crazy Cyclonus to the loner, Blurr. However special mention must be given here to Starscream. This version of Starscream breaks away from the traditional mold of Starscream characters and is not a backstabbing second in command. His character arc is very interesting to watch, and this makes him the best character in the show.

Enjoyment: At first I was forcing myself to watch, especially at the first few eps. But once the hunt for the Miinicon weapons begins, the story takes a more interesting turn, and I found myself very excited to watch the next episode.

Overall: Don't let the bad animation and dubbing stop you from enjoying this series. It's actually good, and I'd recommend it.

Welcome to Myojou Academy, where chosen assassins get to participate in Class Black-by killing the target, they can get any reward they want.

Akuma no Riddle is about Haru Ichinose, the target of Class Black, and Tokaku, one of the assassins who turned into her protector. Their personalities compliment each other-Haru is naive, cheerful, and bubbly, while Tokaku is often serious and all business. It's fun to see how they interact.

Now on to the other characters-the assassins who will be making attempts at Haru's life. Because of the show's set up, the anime is episodic, with an episode focusing on one assassin at the time. This ... gives each character a chance to be at the spotlight; the character's backstory and motivation are also discussed in the episode. And each of the assassins have unique personalities that are different from each other. They also have different ways in attempting to assassinate Haru, ranging from the old fashioned way of using a gun to a sort of game of sorts. This makes each episode interesting.

The anime is also beautifully animated and the fight scenes are well done.
The music of this show is very good! It has one opening, sung by Maaya Uchida. However it has 12 EDs, with the singer being the spotlight character of the episode. And yes, they are all good!

The Ending of the anime, without going into spoilers, is kind of a base breaker. Either you like it or you hate it. I actually like it, but can see why there are people who hate it.

Nevertheless, Akuma no Riddle is definitely a fun show. It can have it's flaws, but it has interesting characters, good fight scenes, and great music, and I think it is worth a watch.

Are you ready to countdown? There is no way out to run!

Mecha shows with female leads aren't really that common (the other one I've watched is Rinne no Lagrange. Not sure if Kannazuki no Miko counts considering the one who piloted most of the time was the guy character) so I decided to give Jinik: Extend a shot. That and it's OP is a reference to the OP of Mobile Suit Gundam. Really. View Jinki Extend's OP, then MSG's. You'll see.

Jinki Extend would have worked better as a longer anime, or one with two seasons. there are two storylines- one starring Aoba, and the other one starring Akao. Chronologically, Aoba's arc occurs before Akao's, but the ... anime shows them both at the same time, making it quite confusing. To save you the trouble, if there's a flashy scene transition it's probably going to shift from one arc to the other.

This showing of two arcs at the same time is not a good idea-the show gave us a lot of time in the first half with Aoba, then it suddenly shifts into focus into Akao in the latter part. However since you have not been given time to "bond" with this new cast, you may not care for them as much.

The mecha design is okay-nothing stands out, really. Music is very good- it gets you pumped up for the battles. Especially in the Akao arc, with it's city setting. Expect lots of collateral damage.

Overall however it's not too bad- I still enjoyed the series, especially near the end since both storylines merged and we get too see characters from both arcs fight together, which was great.
This would have been better if it had two arcs-or at least, if it showed everything in chronological order. As it stands it's just an average anime-still enjoyable, but don't expect it to be really good.

Angelic Layer was one of the anime I watched growing up.
I was recently reminded of it by the anime Gundam Build Fighters which also has a similar premise, so I thought, "What the hell, let's rewatch Angelic Layer. I've forgotten much of the details anyway."

I enjoyed the series. The battles were fun to watch and definitely enjoyable. The rivals all have some kind of special ability which makes every fight unique. However the damage is not consistent, sometimes a punch or kick takes out half the life bar, and other times it does barely a scratch (sometimes I think they should have gotten rid ... of the lifebar instead....). Also I didn't get how the tournament works.

Story is good enough, nothing special. Misaki, our protagonist who has a disappeared mom, moves to tokyo. There she meets new friends, discovers the sport Angelic Layer and becomes a player (or Deus, as the anime calls the players) of the sport. The characters were interesting and Icchan is one of my favorite characters. He's one of the comic relief-there are funny moments here and there which made me laugh.

Overall I'd say it's a good anime. If you like good one-on-one battles (or maybe you enjoyed Build Fighters and is looking for something similar while they're making the second season) then I'd recommend this anime to you.

Turn A Gundam (along with Mobile Fighter G Gundam) may stand out as the oddballs of the Gundam universe.
Set in a time period resembling the industrial revolution, Turn A pits mobile suits VS fighter planes. Weird, huh?
Another oddity is the lead suit, Turn A or "White Doll" as it is often called. Instead of having a V-fin, it has a mustache. It may turn you down at first, but soon you'll grow to love it. The Turn X, the enemy counterpart of Turn A, is pretty nice as well.
The characters are memorable too. There's Loran Cehack, the pilot of the White Doll; Lieutenant Harry, this ... series' Char Clone; and Gym Ghinginham, this series' main antagonist who only appears in the end of the series.
The story is more on the political side-negotiations between the two sides, the Earth and the Dianna Counter or the Moon faction. You see, the moon faction wants to return to earth, but of course the Earth won't let that happen easily. Aiding the Earth is Loran Cehack, who joins Earth against the moon, despite being a moonrace himself.
Aside from the Turn A and Turn X, mentioned above, we see the SUMO,used by the royal guard of the Moon; the WaDom, a 2-legged weapons platform; and the FLAT, a mobile suit as well as a transport unit. There's more of course, but I'm not telling. The uniqueness of the designs make them stand out.
Of course there's also Zakus (from the original gundam) and Kapools (gundam zz). What are they doing there? Watch to find out.
At first I was bored when I was watching the initial 10 episodes or so. I even muttered to myself, "is this gundam?" but I stuck with it through the end, and I got a real treat as the series progressed.

Set the same time as Gundam Seed destiny, Stargazer tells the story of Selen Mcgriff, a scientist and Sven Ca Bayan, a member of Earth Alliance's Phantom Pain. Of course, you don't need to watch Destiny to understand ths story.
I loved the story. I liked the characters especially Selene, Sven, and that guy who died fighting the Jinn (forgot his name...)
The mobile suit designs are good too. Stargazer looks great, plus there's Blu Duel and Verde Buster, throwbacks to Duel and Buster from the earlier Gundam SEED.
The battles were of course good, but since each ep is limited to 15 minutes, it feels like you ... want to see more.
That's my opinion on this series in fact. It's good, but there's way too much happening which results in everything getting condensed to fit the time limit. Because of that, it leaves you wanting more. If ever they make a longer version, I sure will be watching.