Archive for the ‘Anime’ Category

Byousoku 5cm – Makoto Shinkai is an anime god.

You probably still remember my recent post about the animated film Beyond The Clouds–well, this is a brand new movie from the same director and animation studio! Byousoku 5cm, literally meaning 5 Centimeters Per Second, just came out in Japan this September. The art is absolutely fantastic (as you can probably assume by the fact I posted 65 screenshots of it. *_*), there is some definite improvement in the quality of the art since their previous project, Beyond The Clouds. The art is extremely colorful and extraordinarily detailed at times. You’d almost swear you were looking at the real thing in some scenes!

Beyond The Clouds – A moving masterpiece

Beyond The Clouds was an extraordinary anime, but not so much in the story as the artistry. I call it “a moving masterpiece” because the art in the movie is like a moving painting. People have said that of just about all forms of anime, but this one very much is a piece of moving art. Pictures alone don’t really do justice to the quality of the art, as much of it is in the movement and small changing details like the flashing of lightning or the distorted view created by heat vapors. Parts of this movie actually managed to feel warm despite the video medium being technically incapable of projecting physical things such as temperature.

Higurashi No Naku Koro Ni Kai – Don’t watch the sequel first, like me. >.>

So, I started watching Higurashi No Naku Koro Ni Kai–I got through the first five episodes before figuring out that there was another season that came before this. Oops. Now I’ll have to go back and watch the previous season. It started out all light-hearted and then suddenly everyone was dead. I was a little confused when I looked it up a little further online to find stuff to write about on here and saw all these screenshots from what was apparently the real first five episodes and I didn’t recognize any of it. Why must animes have different names for different seasons? It’s confusing that way. >.>

School Days – Narutaru if it we’re a romance.

School Days was a very entertaining high-school life kind of show for about the first ten episodes, then everything went bad. Not in the sense that it sucked, but in the sense that the love was dead. The last two episodes were dark and violent, especially much the final episode. School Days was very much like Narutaru in that regard in that the story completely shifted to a dark and violent finale. I kind of expected it because of what I had heard about School Days reading about it on the internet, but I didn’t know exactly what was going to happen.

Seto No Hanayome – Absurd and hilarious, an excellent comedy!

Gonzo has once again brought us a truly epic comedy with their new series, Seto No Hanayome. So far I’ve watched the first 5 episodes and it’s definitely the best show currently on my watch list. It’s a very absurd, slapstick comedy, giving it a fast-pace that just about anyone can enjoy. You certainly won’t be bored watching this piece of comedy gold!

ef: a tale of memories – A great eroge conversion.

Directed by Shin Onuma, ef is a recent anime conversion of an eroge game know as ef: a fairy tale of the two. So far the Prologue and first 2 episodes have looked quite promising. This show is definitely on my watch list, Shaft did quite well on the art for this–everything is very vivid and colorful. The character designs are very well done and unique looking, with interesting personalities to match their interesting appearances. The story hasn’t gotten rolling too much yet, but what I’ve seen of it has been quite good, albeit not really anything new for the genre.

Casshern – Live Action Anime never felt so right.

Casshern at last comes to North America on October 16th! That’s tomorrow! If you watch one movie this year-heck, this decade-make it this. From the cinematography to the drama to the action this movie is leaps and bounds beyond anything in it’s realm. Some of the more hardcore anime fans out there may think the name sounds familiar; this is actually a remake of the hit 1973 anime Shinzo Ningen Casshân! Plus the theme song is done by Utada Hikaru…honestly, how could you possibly go wrong with her writing the theme song? Think of it as The Matrix if it was a billion times more awesome. That’s one heck of a lot of awesome.

Save Totoro’s Forest! – Miyazaki’s inspiration.

Famed Studio Ghibli director Hayao Miyazaki has raised 73 million yen (US$620,000) to preserve a small forest local residents call Totoro’s Forest. 25 million yen (US$210,000) of the 73 million yen total came from donations from the general public! This enormous sum has been presented to the city of Higashimurayama in hopes that the historical patch of trees can remain for future generations to enjoy.

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