- Last OnlineJan 12, 10:16 AM
- GenderMale
- BirthdayOct 28, 1994
- LocationStorrs, Connecticut
- JoinedJun 25, 2015
No friend yet.
RSS Feeds
|
![]()
Nov 16, 2021
Futaribeya is basically a Cute Girls Doing Cute Things manga. The characters are very cute, the art is pretty, and they don't have many real problems. The story follows Sakurako and Kasumi from their first day of high school all the way through college, as they mostly just kinda hang out. Kasumi's extremely susceptible to both heat, cold, and hunger, so most of the time she doesn't have the energy to do much, and Sakurako's extremely accommodating, so she's usually fine with just staying in their room and making dinner.
The romance is... around. Well ok, so Sakurako and Kasumi are clearly in love with
...
each other, with Sakurako being far more open and obvious with her affection whereas Kasumi's a lot more subdued. It would be ridiculous to try and argue that they're not a couple, but for some reason this is still left up to the reader. Both girls explicitly refuse to define their relationship, even when asked, and just brush the question off with a "no labels really fit" type response. This is despite most of the other characters starting and maintaining romantic relationships. There's nothing wrong, in theory, with a refusal to define your relationship to other people, but in a genre that often has trouble with this, it feels vaguely cowardly. Nothing about Sakurako and Kasumi's relationship would meaningfully change if they referred to each other as their girlfriend, and there are other couples that do so, but for some reason the main couple just... doesn't want to. There's no way to complain about this without seeming whiny and entitled, but like, come on, just... just have them say it. It almost seems like the author wasn't allowed to make the main characters an official couple, and that's why the other characters get together. Like, as a compromise.
Kasumi's also just not especially likable as a character. Sakurako's open and friendly, she likes cooking, and has a perfect memory. Kasumi's pretty, and that's kind of her only positive trait. She eats a ton, is always out of energy, doesn't have any interests, and is usually the one to reject Sakurako's advances. It's entirely possible that Kasumi's just comfortable with a different level of affection than Sakurako, but her rejections feel kind of mean. I'm not entirely sure how to describe it, but Kasumi sort of acts like she thinks Sakurako's joking around? She also just doesn't really have anything going on. Sakurako has stories of the things her families did for different holidays and festivals, and for almost all of them, Kasumi goes "oh I didn't really do anything" or "I just stayed home on those days."
Sakurako, on the other hand, is really fun and likable. She honestly carries the series, and it almost feels like the author cranked up her infatuation with Kasumi early on in order to justify the relationship. She's usually the one to suggest activities, or to agree to go do something for a friend or teacher, which gets Kasumi off the couch. She's got a few good gags (when tutoring people she tends to tell them "to start with, memorize the textbook" and it's pretty silly).
Other than the main couple and their shenanigans, the appeal of the story comes from watching these characters grow up and continue on in their lives. It's somewhat rare that a story like this goes past high school and actually has the characters be in college. Sakurako and Kasumi age, they start drinking, they look for jobs, and move apartments several times. You get to watch these kids grow up, and I think I might cry when the series does end (and it looks like it's almost there).
I've gone on long enough at this point. Futaribeya is a cute manga, and it's best enjoyed if you don't expect the main couple to explicitly define their relationship, and if Kasumi's behavior doesn't get to you. Also the characters are sometimes drawn with part of their face sticking out and I think that's just how the mangaka draws chibis.
Reviewer’s Rating: 7
What did you think of this review?
Nice
 0
Love it
 0
Funny
 0
Confusing
 0
Well-written
 0
Creative
 0Show all
![]()
Jun 27, 2018
Cardcaptor Sakura was great, and I think Clear Card gets a little too much credit because of that. I don't think I'll be able to avoid spoiling the show entirely, but for the most part anyone reading this already knows if they're going to watch this show or not.
Story: 3
Clear Card's story is drip fed to the audience so much, it makes modern American cartoons look like they're proceeding at a fast pace. Sakura's cards become clear for... some reason... making them unusable. Gradually, they start manifesting again based on Sakura's wishes (though she's not aware that this is the reason the cards are
...
coming back), and she has to capture them again. Meanwhile, there's a new transfer student who acts very similar to Sakura and even has a similar last name, and her suspicious butler. The student, Akiho, is just a perfectly nice kid, but the butler and her little bunny doll thing act all shady and suspicious just because. Additionally, Sakura keeps having dreams, sometimes in the middle of the day, of a mysterious figure wearing fancy robs and just sort of standing there. Every time she realizes who the figure obviously is, she conveniently forgets when she wakes up so the story can continue. The majority of the time is dedicated to slice-of-life scenes where every character is polite and courteous basically all the time. The only enjoyable part of any given episode is the card capturing, and even that is hit-or-miss. Sakura has clearly gotten much better at using her powers, and when she swaps quickly between different cards it can be really cool, however Clear Card can't seem to make up its mind about whether or not Sakura needs to subdue the cards before she can capture them. At one point she just realizes she's trapped in a labyrinth, pulls out her staff, and captures the card right then and there. In other, notably earlier, episodes, she does need to subdue them, so it's almost like they just sort of forgot, got lazy with it, or were rushing through the cards due to time constraints.
Art: 7
The one thing I will give Clear Card is that it's pretty. Sakura and Tomoyo are adorable as ever and the scenes where Sakura has to actually do something in order to capture the card are animated well. Early on I actually had high hopes for this one because of this.
Sound: 6
I'll admit this is basically a moot category for me. I can just never remember much about the sound of an anime. Sakura's "hoeeee"s are cute as ever and Rika's replacement voice actress does a good job in her scene. That's about all I can say for this category.
Character: 3
The characters in Clear Card are like a poor imitation of the characters from CCS. On top of their near universal blandness, a lot of their other personality traits seem to have been removed too. Tomoyo still has an obsession with Sakura but she doesn't seem to be in love with her anymore. Toya and Yukito don't seem to have any romantic tension anymore. Kero's personality has devolved into "plays video games and eats food" and Syaoran isn't remotely impulsive or irritable anymore. Even Meiling, when she shows up, doesn't do much to stir things up. I'd been hoping that her reintroduction would spur things on and make the characters do things, but she was just as watered down as the rest of them.
Enjoyment: 2
Clear Card is not a fun show to watch. There were times in the middle of the season where I skipped through episodes to get to the capture scene. To be clear, I like slice-of-life shows, but Clear Card's slice-of-life is just so dull. Why would I want to watch Sakura and her friends drink tea together and tell each other how delicious it is? There are also a lot of little things, like how the characters have smartphones despite the show canonically taking place so soon after CCS, and Eriol not doing anything the whole season for no explained reason. The way they dangle the plot in front of your face and let the characters take their time coming to the same obvious conclusions is really frustrating. There's also a lot of obvious pandering to nostalgia, most notably in the episode where Sakura goes on an aquarium date with Syaoran and it's as if they remade the Sakura/Yukito aquarium date episode from the original show, to the point where a lot of scenes can be compared side by side.
Overall: 3
I love Cardcaptor Sakura, but Clear Card is a bad spinoff/sequel. The few good points are drowned out by the agonizing bad ones. The worst part is that it doesn't even get a complete ending. The ending of the season is just sequel-bait for the next and Sakura still doesn't get the answers she wants, and the convenient "oh she figured it out but forgot" plot device is still firmly in place. Usually when a show is a 2 or 3, I'm mad when thinking about it. For Clear Card I'm just disappointed.
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
What did you think of this review?
Nice
0
Love it
0
Funny
0
Confusing
0
Well-written
0
Creative
0Show all
![]()
May 17, 2018
Hitsugi no Chaika is... fine. When watching the show, I took note of positive and negative aspects of it. While the length of the positives is a small fraction of the length of the negatives, it was at least enjoyable enough to earn a 5.
Story: 7
I did actually enjoy the story. It's at least unusual, if not actually interesting. A seemingly immortal emperor dies after a 500 year reign, leaving behind a daughter who takes up a coffin and seeks to collect his remains for a funeral. It gets much more complicated than that, and not necessarily better, but that is at least a
...
unique setup. Additionally, the execution is alright as well, though the reveal at the end of season 2 is predictable. Overall it's pretty good, nothing amazing but not bad. It really falls apart after this though.
Art: 6
The art only really gets a 6 because I really like Chaika's character design, and some of the animals, vehicles, and characters look alright too. For the most part it's generic 2010s anime fare. Not gonna hurt your eyes but not especially memorable. The magic circles in particular are just the same thing basically every time.
Sound: 5
I'm generally not great at remembering voices or music but other than Chaika, all the voices aren't particularly memorable. One character in particular is especially bad though. Speaking of which:
Characters: 3
Of the four main characters, in descending order.
Chaika - she's actually a good character. Her initial motivation is relatable and somewhat innocent, she's adorable, and she goes through some character growth. She saves this category.
Frederica - She's mostly the same from the end of her introduction episode until the end of the series. She's aloof, just wants to fight, I guess she gains some respect for the main characters but that's about it.
Toru - yikes. This is our main character. He's a deadpan "grew up as an assassin (or in this case, saboteur)" type character. Unfortunately, his motivations don't make a lot of sense. He says he wants to fight and directly says he's willing to start a war just so he can fight, but this doesn't come through in his character at all. Every time he fights it's involuntary or due to circumstances. He doesn't seek out conflict, so why is that his motivation? Also at one point he says "I keep telling you, a saboteur is his master's tool" despite that being the first time he said that. On top of that, his main power is both boring and really edgy. He repeats this mantra about being steel and feeling no emotion and it makes him stronger and faster. The chant the kind of thing I would have thought was cool as a 12 year-old, but it just seems ridiculous now. In the third to last episode of the series, a character says "you never change Toru" and he's right. Unfortunately, Toru's not the worst character, and he actually shares his power with the worst one.
Akari - Akari is the second worst anime character I've ever seen, though mercifully the worst isn't part of this series. Her voice singlehandedly lowered my score for the sound, which Chaika's voice had raised. She is Toru's adopted sister but they never act like siblings. I can't, off the top of my head, think of a scene where they look at each other. Toru has no emotion in his voice but Akari makes it seem like he does, considering how deadpan she seems all the time. Her personality fluctuates for no apparent reason, and it's impossible to tell if she likes her brother or hates him. She is explicitly attracted to him but never shows any emotion at all to confirm whether this is actually true. Unfortunately, she was also written to be extremely possessive of Toru, so whenever he looks at other girls she gets "angry." In her introduction scene, she sees Toru eating with Chaika, takes a hammer, and smashes up the bar. Since she is Akari however, she does this with no emotion at all. Also, Toru is blamed for the destruction by patrons and bar staff alike. Her outfit is also ridiculous, she wears a tiny miniskirt despite being entirely combat-focused as a person. The way she treats Toru is actually unfair, like there's a scene where she can see his hallucinations as he's in a dreamlike state, and he's hallucinating a peaceful, happy life with Chaika. She calls this "unforgivable." She also accuses him of having an insatiable libido every time he interacts with a girl. This is a flat out mischaracterization, and I have no idea why she is written this way. She's not even all that important to the plot, she's usually sidelined when something interesting is happening. In the final battle she fights mindless enemies. Akari, and the way people react to her stupid abusive behavior, is enough to dock this entire series at least 1 point, and she's the primary reason this section gets a 3. In another series, Frederica or Toru would be the worst, but Chaika has Akari.
Enjoyment: 4
As cute as Chaika is and as interesting as the story itself is, Akari [enraged rant removed] and the world itself contribute to the low enjoyment score. The world is boring and poorly explained. Five years ago, Emperor Arthur Gaz was defeated by eight heroes. No one apparently remembers the heroes, and all of history was shaped by Arthur Gaz, including the ridiculous, nonsensical magic system. The magic system involves saying a bunch of words in gibberish and using magical ammo, made by fossil fuels or memories, to cast magic, except when this isn't necessary. There is literally a moment in this series where Chaika remarks that they had to leave all her magical ammo behind, then uses magic. There are also scenes where people are shown just firing their magical weapons without an incantation because that scene didn't need it, whereas in other scenes using magic without an incantation is considered weird. It's also hard to tell where anything is in relation to anything else, though I do recognize that that is often hard to show in anime.
Overall: 5
Hitsugi no Chaika isn't necessarily a bad series, and I didn't have trouble getting through it, but if something like Akari's awful character and [enraged rant removed], the stupid magic system, or the boring world get to you in the beginning, it's not going to get better.
Reviewer’s Rating: 5
What did you think of this review?
Nice
0
Love it
0
Funny
0
Confusing
0
Well-written
0
Creative
0Show all
![]()
Dec 25, 2017
Children of the Mud Whale is a beautiful show with an interesting world that is a complete waste of time. Most of us watched it for the pretty background art and fascinating concept, but it fails miserably to deliver on these.
Story: 3
3 is a bit generous and is there solely because of 1) a death early on that caught me by surprise, and 2) the world building. Mud Whale has an interesting world, with whale/ships powered by grotesque monstrosities on a sand ocean. There's an evil empire and other kingdoms scattered around, it all seems like it should be really entertaining but it just isn't.
...
The direction is awful, it feels like they didn't take their episode numbers into account at all. A third party that intends to ally with the Mud Whale shows up at random in one episode and just hangs out with them for the rest of the series, not affecting anything. Information is doled out whenever the show feels like it and characters are introduced and killed off in bulk.
Art: 8
The art is where this show excels. The background art is beautiful, the world looks interesting and fun. You want to learn more about the unique society on the mud whale, their specific customs that they've developed from their years in isolation, the world they inhabit. Where it fails is the action direction. Emotionless enemy soldiers wait their turn to attack the helpless and allow themselves to be mowed down for no reason. There is a scene where a weakened old man is able to kill two soldiers by stumbling into them off a cliff, after they'd already cut a gash into his chest. Why they didn't get out of the way is behind comprehension. The show doesn't look bad necessarily in motion but it's nothing impressive. It'll get you some nice screenshots though.
Sound: 8
I've got a terrible memory when it comes to background music and OP/ED themes. There is, however, a memorable scene in one of the episodes where a character sings a song amidst a battle and it's genuinely beautiful. It briefly revived my hope in this series before it was beaten back into the sand.
Characters: 1
The characters are the worst part of this show.
Chakuro - the main character who doesn't feel like a main character. He's described as an archivist but this aspect of his personality is so underdeveloped that I genuinely forgot that that was his job until a character referred to him as "Archivist of Falaina." On top of that he's a weak, ineffectual crybaby who, unlike better crybabies like Deku from My Hero Academia, never gets better.
Lykos - she literally had the emotions sucked out of her prior to the series and it shows. She's quiet and mopey, refusing to give potentially crucial information until the end of the series despite having it the entire time.
Ouni - The only decent character. I think he even exhibits character development, but my god is he not enough to save this section of the review, let alone the entire show.
The main issue is, as I mentioned before, that they introduce characters at random. "Oh this character's going on a potentially dangerous mission? Give him a best friend who wants to come with." "Hm... there's not enough internal strife, let's introduce two new characters who literally explain away their absence with a 'we've stuck to the edges of the Mud Whale til now' as if that excuses their delayed introduction and have them stir things up" They're reluctant to kill off important characters so they invent new characters whenever they want and throw them in the story, hoping to eke out some emotional payoff.
Enjoyment: 2
There are just enough pretty moments to edge this series above a 1 for enjoyment. It's not fun to watch, it's really boring even during the action. The fact that they introduce new characters just to kill them off destroys any tension once you know who's going to survive. There are about 2 deaths with any real impact, and even then only the first one is felt by the viewer. The penalty for the magic system that the characters have is short lifespans, which is a totally ineffectual penalty. Sure the older characters are likely to die, chances are it won't affect anyone you really care about for another few years, and it's difficult to care about these characters anyway because they just don't do much.
Overall: 3
Children of the Mud Whale is a bad show. It's a pretty show, but it's bad. The art and sound keep it from being a 1 or a 2 but they are not enough to give it an even passable score. This is, after all, an anime, not an art book.
Reviewer’s Rating: 3
What did you think of this review?
Nice
0
Love it
0
Funny
0
Confusing
0
Well-written
0
Creative
0Show all
![]()
Dec 21, 2017
This series sure came out of nowhere.
When I first saw it on MAL I barely even glanced at it, I thought it was just going to be a generic Cute Girls Doing Cute Things anime, but my god is it heartwarming.
Konohana Kitan is an episodic slice of life story about these fox girls that work at Konohanatei, a hot springs for the gods. It seems to exist between life and death, though it's never fully explained. There's a lot in this series that's not fully explained, but because of its nature I think fully explaining things would ruin it a little.
Since the
...
attendants at Konohanatei consistently serve Japanese kami, a lot of the plot lines involve Japanese legends. It gives off a similar vibe to Spirited Away, though in a more human-like modern anime style.
There are a few backstories that could be fleshed out, like I'm really curious about Yuzu's past, and Ren, Satsuki, and Okiku definitely get more character development than the rest of them, but it's just so good, it made me smile, it was heartwarming, it was sad at times, it was funny, it was cute, watch this series I want it to get a season 2.
It is worth noting that it aired on the same day as Urahara, so my opinion might have been inflated, though I did wait until the next day to watch the final episode and it's still just as good when not sitting next to the dumpster.
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
What did you think of this review?
Nice
0
Love it
0
Funny
0
Confusing
0
Well-written
0
Creative
0Show all
![]()
Dec 20, 2017
Urahara is dreadful.
It tries to trick you into liking it by having a unique style and plot twists but don't be fooled, Urahara has very little to it in the end.
Story: 3
The story in this show is nothing. Aliens called Scoopers come to earth and steal culture, because that's what they do, they have no culture so they steal it. It's worth noting that, in episode 1 the humans decide to call them Scoopers because of how they "scoop" up culture and that turns out to just be the actual name of the species. Anyway it takes place in Harajuku where three girls
...
with a barebones ability to simulate human emotion are running a store called "Park." A little girl and sentient fried shrimp show up and give them these little things that look like truffles and they get magical girl transformation sequences and go to fight the Scoopers. It could definitely be more generic but it's certainly not creative, despite its overuse of the word.
Art: 6
Art is the only thing I give a decent score because the backgrounds at least are unique. It has a distinctive art style that does not at all translate into animation. The animation in this show is terrible, I've seen One Piece episodes that were animated better. The character designs are interesting but none of it means anything. Kotoko has cat ears and a tail and Rito has devil horns but they're just like... a fashion thing. Kotoko doesn't act particularly like a cat, Rito doesn't act particularly like a demon, it's just a shorthand to make the characters look different. Also, after a few episodes the pastels start to hurt your eyes, so the art style doesn't actually work that well.
Sound: 3
I don't remember any of the tracks from this show outside of the opening, which changes tempo seemingly at random. I eventually started skipping it. The voice acting is pretty bad, though it does improve a little by the end of the series. Misa's verbal tick becomes flat out grating once she becomes a more important character though.
Characters: 1
The characters in this show suck. They are basic character traits extrapolated into people.
Kotoko is the biggest offender. She's the smart character, and as such, they'll just have her say smart sounding things. One of the most obvious examples is when a character mentions DNA and she interjects to explain that DNA stands for Deoxyribonucleic Acid.
Mari's personality is all over the place. In one episode she'll be a diva, obsessed with her followers, and in another she's always just been a clothing designer who really wants to own a store.
Rito's personality is that she is the quiet one. She has at least some development in terms of accepting that her art's quality isn't defined by how many people see it.
All three of them are terrible at expressing emotion, their eyes basically always look the same, which is weird in such a stylized show where they should really be going off-model more often. Instead they have a standard model and a chibi model.
Enjoyment: 1
This is not a fun show to watch. It's tedious, some episodes have just actual filler. Episode 9 has 10 actual minutes of people begging with each other and getting nowhere. The end of the series in particular is really bad with its time wasting, and I get the feeling this was supposed to be a 10 episode series that got stretched on to 12. Seriously episode 11 has an almost Scooby Doo-esque chase scene that is just there to waste time. It's not even well animated. On top of that, some of the scenes in episode 9 are legitimately vomit inducing.
Overall: 2
I can't in good faith give Urahara a 1. It has inventive character and background art and I think someone there was trying, but there is just no appeal here. Do not watch Urahara.
Reviewer’s Rating: 2
What did you think of this review?
Nice
0
Love it
0
Funny
0
Confusing
0
Well-written
0
Creative
0Show all
![]()
Dec 23, 2016
Lostorage Incited Wixoss isn't the worst anime I've ever seen but it certainly doesn't live up to its predecessors.
Story: 5/10
The previous Wixoss shows were these high-stakes games where if you win you get a wish granted and if you lose it's reversed and your miserable. Despite the clunky explanations they gave it was still a clever and intimidating, the consequences mattered to the characters enough that the stakes were high. Lostorage changes it around so their memories are at stake, and while the downside is losing your memories and becoming an entirely different person, the upside is... the ability to change one of
...
your memories.
How incredibly situational. In fact, if you want to change one of your memories you can just do that, that's how memory works. On top of that, the major conflict between the main characters feels incredibly forced.
Art and Sound: 6
I am a whelp and don't generally notice the art and sound in anime. The environment the battles take place in is pretty cool but gets old quickly. Nothing else popped out at me.
Characters: 3
This is where Lostorage really falls flat.
Homura Suzuko - Suzuko is the "main character" of Lostorage but she really doesn't feel like it. We don't really get into her headspace all that much past the first few episodes and because of how the show works by not really explaining the card game much, it's difficult to see her growth. If anything, it seems like rather than improving at the game like Ruko from Selector, she learned how to make up rules as she goes along.
Hanna Mikage - Hanna is a weird mix of the cute small character due to her hands always being in her sleeves and the cold analytical character due to her personality. While Hanna as the best reason for wanting to win the game, regaining the memories of what happened to her late little brother, she also has the most obnoxious speech quirk of stating a word that summarizes her sentences before saying them. An example would be a sentence like "Suspicion. What are you doing here?" which would be ok for a minor character, but she ends up becoming a major character in the story and it is incredibly grating.
Shohei Shirai - Is a nice guy. This is pretty much the extent to his personality, he's just really nice and wants to get some memories back about soccer or something. He refuses to fight battles early on even though the rules this time around impose a time limit that needs to be upheld by battles, so I don't know what he thought the outcome would be. His effect in the story is basically just to make one character question her actions but not actually do anything.
Chinatsu Morikawa - She's the secondary main character, or arguably even the main character in this show, but I saved her til now because holy crap does this character suck. I hope it's not a spoiler since it happens pretty early on that she effectively becomes a villain for most of the show. The issue with this is that her reasons are absolutely absurd. She wants to forget her memories of her childhood with Suzuko in order to "become stronger." It gets to the point where she has effectively killed people for this and she becomes completely irredeemable. I hate this character, she is an awful person for no reason.
Kou Satomi - Here is the only good character. Satomi has a reasonably interesting backstory and is entertaining and expressive enough to be fun to watch.
Unlike in Selector, the LRIGs are barely even characters. I guess it comes from them being a manifestation of their selectors' memories rather than existing people with their own names and personalities, but there is no emotional connection there, no matter what the ending tries to dredge up.
Enjoyment: 4
I kept trying to like this show. I thought at the beginning that the concept was interesting, but that was because I thought that the winner of the battles got to change their opponents' memories, which could have led to an interesting plot whereby the characters don't know what's real or and maybe we would have gotten an unreliable narrator. Instead the premise just makes the battles feel like more of a chore than anything. I like how Satomi abused the system for his own amusement, and I suppose it makes sense for the time limit to be there in that case, but the incentive to winning is mostly just not having to play the game anymore, which makes the show just feel empty, like the characters aren't really working toward anything, they just want it to be over.
Overall: 4
Lostorage is not a very good show, which is disappointing because I thought Selector was great. It got to the point where the intricacies of the game really should have been explained better. The coin betting mechanic they introduce was cool and made every player seem unique, but without a knowledge of Wixoss as a game it doesn't make a lot of sense. The final episode is full of cop-outs too and while I do like the ending scene, a lot of the emotional moments feel profoundly undeserved.
Reviewer’s Rating: 4
What did you think of this review?
Nice
0
Love it
0
Funny
0
Confusing
0
Well-written
0
Creative
0Show all
![]()
Jun 25, 2016
Note: The bottom of the review contains spoilers. There's a spoiler tag and everything but best to warn early.
Sometimes when watching a really amazing anime, I feel the need to watch something truly dreadful to remind myself what the alternative is. For this purpose, Hundred is ok. For any other purpose, Hundred is awful.
Story: 1/10
Some animes can get away with not having a plot. Lucky Star, for example, doesn't need to have a story, since it's a silly little slice of life anime. Hundred, however, is not. Hundred tries to have a plot sort of, with evil alien robot-like creatures invading the earth
...
and a virus? The characters are called Slayers and the show seems undecided on whether or not all of them are infected with the alien virus or only some of them. Concepts are brought up but not explored at all at random, like the N-Shield which shows up in the second episode but is never really explained or anything.
Art/Sound: 1/10
Nothing memorable, there's not really anything I can say about this. The characters look ok but not really much different from standard anime characters. Even the robot aliens, fight scenes, and transformation sequences are visually unimpressive.
Characters: 1/10
Every character is a trope. Generic anime protagonist, blonde drill-haired tsundere rich girl, childhood friend love interest, hospitalized little sister whose body is weak because of an unidentified illness, pop idol with a thing for the main character, etc. Hundred introduces a bunch of characters and only really expands on three of them. Of those three, only one goes through any character development and it's a problem that's introduced and then fixed in the span of a couple minutes, which is, incidentally, how the anime deals with the majority of the problems that crop up. Even the main villain is only ever mentioned until the final episode, and her motivations are laughably pointless. With only 12 episodes to its name, Hundred can't possibly work through all the characters it foolishly throws out.
Enjoyment: 2/10
I laughed a few times, though most of the time when that happened, it was immediately followed by a shake of the head, a sigh, and a "my god this anime is awful."
Overall: 2/10
Overall, Hundred is a slog, barely even fit for what I wanted out of it. It succeeded at reminding me what a bad anime looks like so I can better appreciate the good ones, but looking back I realize there are other bad anime out there that would fulfill the job better. The main character is so remarkably forgettable that I think I've already forgotten his name as I write this. I actually had to look at the synopsis to remember that his name is Hayato. Near the end I wanted so badly to drop the show but I didn't for the sake of this review. Hundred is terrible.
Final Episode: 1/10
I think in this particular instance the final episode deserves its own section because it is truly baffling. I don't think I can do this section without spoilers, so I'll put this large
[SPOILER ALERT}
right there.
Anyway, the finale has a number of oddities. The main villain invades the school, but is killed by a background character who was supposedly using her, even though his plan seems to have been able to work regardless of her presence. He vaguely mentions that he has some plans but he never shows up again after this scene, so on the off chance that this travesty gets a second season, I suppose we'll see what that was about. As it stands, it's weird and irrelevant. So while the villain herself didn't actually do anything before getting killed, she did apparently activate a bunch of robots to turn into exploding bees, who try to latch onto power stations and explode. They do so but nothing really happens, the ship keeps its power, there's still a barrier up, and all the civilians are safe. There doesn't seem to be any reason for the exploding bees to exist. Seriously they supposedly put on the auxiliary power, which turns all the lights red to indicate that they're on backup power, but then the lights go back to normal in the next scene and it's never mentioned again. Later on, a magical super powered girl shows up and cures the main character's sister of her illness by touching her. Yep. Lastly, the final, climactic moment was between the main character and some girl he had no interaction with beforehand. He introduced himself to her in that scene with his full name. I think the writers were just as tired of this series as I was by this point because nothing makes sense and it seems to just wrap up because it was the time to do so. The villain introduces super alien robots with no weak points but then the main characters just beat them back as easily as they do the other ones while exclaiming "wow it's really hard without weak points." What was the point of introducing these enemies if all they're going to do is change the dialogue a bit?
[SPOILERS END]
So that's the final episode of Hundred. If you can sit through the first 11 episodes, I recommend watching this thing just so you can experience the weirdness that is this finale. Of course, it's not a good anime by any stretch of the imagination, it's not even a good trainwreck anime like Big Order, but it's... uh... something.
Reviewer’s Rating: 2
What did you think of this review?
Nice
0
Love it
0
Funny
0
Confusing
0
Well-written
0
Creative
0Show all
![]()
Feb 14, 2016
Soul Eater NOT! is an anime that's not particularly good but receives much more flack than it probably deserves thanks to its relation to the far superior Soul Eater.
Story: 6/10
The plot is... okay. It doesn't really break any new ground, with the whole "two girls want to be with me and I can't decide which one I want" plot-line being established in episode 1. Oddly enough, this plot-line is established minutes after the main character, Tsugumi, meets her suitors, so to speak. She's had a short conversation with Meme and a rather unpleasant interaction with Anya, hardly basis for such a dilemma. As the
...
plot moves on it gets reasonably interesting, with Tsugumi learning how to become a weapon, something we never got to see in Soul Eater, and a villain, which I didn't expect in an anime that tries to emulate slice-of-life.
Art: 7/10
I quite liked the art style. The main characters from Soul Eater don't change much other than Maka's eyes, and the fight scenes are mostly pretty good, discounting an embarrassing moment near the end of Episode 7.
Sound: 5/10
I didn't notice other than the opening theme. I'm bad at the sound department.
Characters: 5/10
The characters are characters. Tsugumi has the most variation, though she has an annoying habit of saying she's "In love with love" despite never actually showing that. She just kind of says it and expects us to accept it as truth. Meme is forgetful. Now you know Meme. Anya is a tsundere rich girl who knows martial arts. Admittedly, she does get some cool scenes here and there but her personality when she's not fighting pretty much amounts to "I don't know the value of money and also I am the tsundere archetype." There are a few other minor characters, with my favorite being Clay, the guy who's smart but not very quick on his feet so whenever someone asks him what he's doing and he has to come up with an excuse, he says he's in love with someone.
Enjoyment: 6/10
I happened to be in the mood for a cute slice-of-life anime with action thrown in there, and Soul Eater NOT! largely delivered on that. It's not a particularly good anime, but it gave me what I wanted in a decent manner.
Overall: 6/10
Soul Eater NOT! is not a particularly good anime. At the same time, it's not really as bad as everyone makes it out to be. It has its upsides and it shows some stuff that Soul Eater never got around to. None of the main characters in Soul Eater ever have trouble learning how to turn into weapons, they know how at the beginning of the series. Seeing a character learn how to do that was pretty nice. It shows how Sid became a zombie and what the Thompson sisters were doing before Kid officially partnered with them. It also goes a long way toward showing what the other students at the school do, since looking at Soul Eater's main characters is like looking at the Justice League and saying "that's what humans are." Seeing the NOT class has its merits. Overall, Soul Eater NOT! is a great way to get yourself motivated to watch Soul Eater again. That's pretty much what it does best.
Reviewer’s Rating: 6
What did you think of this review?
Nice
0
Love it
0
Funny
0
Confusing
0
Well-written
0
Creative
0Show all
![]()
Feb 8, 2016
Since I can't be bothered to write a review for all three seasons that currently exist of Fate/Kaleid liner Prisma Illya, which will be shortened to Fate/Kaleid or variations of that for the rest of this review, this will apply to all of them.
Don't let the apathetic attitude from the first paragraph mislead you, I love Fate/Kaleid, to the point where I was unable to watch any other anime until halfway through my 3rd back-to-back rewatch of the show because I just wanted to be watching Fate/Kaleid.
Fate/Kaleid does something that I see so many animes, including the original Fate/Stay Night 2006 adaptation, forget
...
about. They actually show the normal lives of the characters beyond episode 1. I've seen so many TV shows arbitrarily decide that the magical adventure the characters are on is more important and interesting than their normal lives, and while this may be true in some cases, it also undermines the characters' motivations. Who cares if you're fighting to save the world from being destroyed if all we see of the world is the main characters fighting the bad guys? Fate/Kaleid will dedicate episodes to the characters just having a normal day, with a healthy amount of comedy thrown in.
This is something else Fate/Kaleid does well. It's one of the few animes that has legitimately made me laugh. Comedy in anime so often will either fall flat immediately or become overused to the point where it falls flat. Fate/Kaleid does neither, interspersing it where it needs to be and allowing the serious elements their time. It helps that the characters are often so adorable that I want to punch a steak to feel like a man again before I remember that my fists have all the power of a reasonably enthusiastic puppy and I give up entirely.
The show is not without its flaws. Tatsuko is obnoxious more often than funny (though thankfully she's only a recurring character rather than a main character), some of the rules of magic get wonky or nonsensical at times, and season 2 and beyond include some uncomfortable "mana siphoning" instances that make me start to wonder who exactly those scenes were made for.
I still have more to say but I fear this review has gotten too long and is almost entirely just me gushing about how much I like this show. It's probably not for everybody, but I know I sure loved it, which is especially impressive because I thought Fate/Stay Night was rotting trash. In the interest of ending on a light note, Fate/Kaleid is like watching a puppy and a kitten snuggle up together in the fur of a large bunny. It's probably not high art, but it sure does make you happy to watch.
Reviewer’s Rating: 10
What did you think of this review?
Nice
0
Love it
0
Funny
0
Confusing
0
Well-written
0
Creative
0Show all
|
