Anime ETS

Sharing my thoughts on anime

[animeets]

I’m Actually a Big Fan of SAO

There’s a lot of details about this but it’s 2am and I need sleep. So I’ll come back to this thought later. I don’t think it’s a great or well-written show by any means but there is something about it that I find endearing.

But it’s 2am, so another time.

[animeets]

White Album 2 Symbolism

There’s a very detailed blogpost titled “Being Setsuna is Suffering” from a little over 2 years ago, that to this day hits home about a lot of the painful realities that exist in White Album 2. There are pages and pages of analysis I can write about the literary symbols, metaphors encased and layered on top of one another in the visual novel. Many of these are shared with the anime so if you do plan on playing the visual novel or watching the anime - I ask that you refrain from reading this as there are spoilers below.

The basis of White Album 2 is a love triangle - it’s a very fickle love triangle that is just as complicated as the rest. The truth about this love triangle is that it could never have happened in any shape that wasn’t a triangle. Haruki would never have become friends with Kazusa, Kazusa would never have fallen for him even more and Setsuna wouldn’t even have met Haruki. The story is filled with dramatic irony that shows how hiding one’s feelings can cause problems for everyone. Setsuna’s existence is only suffering, there is no option for her to really obtain the happiness she wants; she knows this and makes the choice to confess to Haruki before Kazusa can. Setsuna is shown to speak to Io before her confession in music room 1 about how she wants Haruki to make the choice. She even says this to Haruki as part of her confession - she really doesn’t want to take him away from Kazusa, but she can’t help but try to get the happiness for herself. Even after he accepts her confession and they start dating she is crying and suffering for what she did to Kazusa. Kazusa’s existence is to be hiding. There is nothing Kazusa can be open about, her feelings for Haruki, her musical skills, her care for Setsuna, her happiness and her sadness. From the very beginning, every part of her hidden self has to be dug out by everyone else, she lacks the capability of unleashing them herself. We see this all the time, from Haruki’s consistent badgering and Setsuna consistent teasing, we figure out Kazusa’s true self much too late in the story. The only person who ironically understands Kazusa the most is the one who misunderstands her intentions and her actions because of her emotions. By the time Setsuna realizes the problems she’s caused it is much too late. Finally - Haruki, the all-knowing, safe, certain, reliable, and smart former classroom rep and shadow committee president. The ironic thing about Haruki is that his existence is ignorance. He’s made out to be the most understanding, rational person in White Album 2 but in reality he knows the least and understands the least. He doesn’t understand the suffering Setsuna goes through, he can’t fathom that Kazusa would have any feelings for him at all, and he doesn’t understand his own emotions either. As a result, he makes bad judgement calls because he succumbs to his uncertainties and failures and makes the worst decisions of his life - decisions that aren’t unreasonable but ultimately change the person he becomes in closing chapter.

Now for why I think this to be true. Almost all the names in White Album have some connection to snow. It’s the season of White Album - winter, which is the motif for suffering and pain to begin with. First of all, Touma Kazusa - written with WinterHorse and hiragana for the first name. The season of winter really is a great example of hiding - because the snow comes to cover everything and change the way we see things. Kazusa is also a boy’s name and is a bit of a hint that this could have been a very different story if Kazusa had been a boy - as Setsuna laments. Of course, Kazusa has a lot of meanings to it as well, but I think the most accurate description would be one who is above. Next, Kitahara Haruki - Northfield Springrarity, this name seems ordinary but really the name itself gives it all away. In Japan, the only place people think of when they think about is Hokkaido, which is on the very north part of Japan. Haruki’s last name is more of a way of showing how embedded he is in the North and to snow than he thinks. The next part is his first name, Spring and rarity. He certainly is a rarity, with the way he acts and thinks - catching the attention of both Setsuna and Kazusa. But the truth is, spring is the season that is following winter, the way Haruki is always chasing after Touma. Not only that, but spring is the season of youth - part of which, is ignorance. Finally, Ogiso Setsuna - SmallGreatTree SnowLeaf. What a fitting name for Setsuna. There is no doubt in my mind that this story was written around Setsuna - the writers might not have made her the story’s true winner but she is without a doubt the most important character in the story and her character design, development and explanations are proof of this. She’s a snowleaf from a SmallGreatTree - she’s not some super idol, but she’s not some nobody either - she’s a very important character in everything and she stands in the center of everything despite not really wanting to be in the spotlight. But she shines and buds in the winter instead of the Spring. As a result, she exists between Haruki and Kazusa, but she wouldn’t have occurred without the two of them being together but it’s also her that brings Haruki around and brings spring forward. It’s hard to ignore the largest use of symbolism - music but there’s just too much in it that I can’t possibly add it in here, it’s going to be a post on it’s own if I do. Each song, each soundtrack, each moment has purpose and it’d be a shame to miss the importance of any. Instead, I’m go to touch on sleep - this is actually a really important motif that is very subtle. For each character, sleep has different meanings and funnily, coincide with their characters. For Setsuna, sleeping is suffering. The times when Setsuna is truly left to tear herself to pieces is when she’s asleep - we see this multiple times when she calls Haruki before going to sleep, tearing herself apart and it’s only when she’s awake in the morning that her nightmare ends. Whenever Setsuna says she was unable to sleep properly it’s almost always cause she’s happy - never because she’s suffering. For Kazusa, sleeping is her way of hiding. She uses it to avoid talking to Haruki, to avoid showing that she cares for those around her and to hide from herself. There is a very important scene where Haruki helps out Chikashi who wasn’t paying attention in class but a few moments later, Haruki is lost in thought with his prep for his schedule that he also doesn’t pay attention. Kazusa, who notices this stops pretending to sleep and listens in class. When she’s called, she wasn’t paying attention and when the teacher swaps to Haruki, who also wasn’t paying attention, she whispers him the page number and section. When she’s awake she doesn’t hide from Haruki, she doesn’t hide from reality. Finally is Haruki - and you guessed it, for Haruki, sleep is ignorance - the fact of not knowing. Haruki falls asleep multiple times during Kazusa’s piano playing - the only time Kazusa really shares her feelings with Haruki is through her piano and as a result, shows that when for Haruki, sleep is his ignorance and the way of him missing everything important. Whenever Haruki falls asleep, he has missed something important - whether it’s something Setsuna says, what causes Setsuna to do something, or something from Kazusa. I hope this gave you something to think about when you watch White Album 2 - because there’s much more to this show than just a heart-wrenching love triangle. It’s a truly beautiful work of art.

[animeets]

Anime of The Past - Pre-Haruhi Era to Haruhi Era

I find The Melancholy of Suzumiya Haruhi to be a perfect spot to draw the line between old and modern anime, kind of the way we use BC and AD. Fitting I think for her character as well.

First Pre-Haruhi Era (Pre 2006)

We begin in 2003, the beginning of the anime that started many of the popular fandoms that exist today. Series like Da Capo, Ikki Tousen and Full Metal Alchemist. 2003 also includes classics like DN Angel, Green Green. Rumbling Hearts and Tsukihime. Of course, one of the first successful comedy anime also started here, Full Metal Panic: Fumoffu. A great place to start a history of anime.

In 2004, there were a ton of genres with lots of experimentation with different things. This is why many notable darker anime happened this year. Notable entrants into the darker anime genre include: Elfen Lied, Gantz, Monster. Some of the long lived anime that started here are: Bleach, Lyrical Nanoha, Major, Maria-sama, School Rumble and YuGiOh GX. 

2005 was the year of safe entrants, animes where the storylines were safe and easy to follow. The likes of Negima, Fate/Stay Night, Tsubasa Chronicle, Zoids Genesis, Eureka 7, Shuffle, Eyeshield 21, Ichigo 100%, Da Capo Sequel, Shakugan no Shana, Full Metal Panic: The Second Raid, Suzuka,  Nanoha and Mushishi. All very good anime, all being leaps and bounds toward the creation of their respective genres. This was the basis for 2006, the beginning of Haruhi Era.

Haruhi Era (2006)

This is the time where Anime really started taking off. Where definitive genres, styles started becoming eminent and where staples for the genres became clear. Haruhi became the staple example of the slice of life genre, while Ouran Host Club, Inukami, Zero no Tsukaima, Kenichi set out to define the comedy harem genre. The steps of Inukami and Zero no Tsukaima are evident today in reference to Yui Horie and Rie Kugimiya’s publicity in their ability to do similar roles. Louse from Zero no Tsukaima also became a staple example of the tsundere character. It would hardly be the turning point of anime with just that. Code Geass, Death Note, Gintama, D-Grayman, Hitman Reborn would become the next anime to follow in the footsteps of the Big 3 (Naruto, Bleach, One Piece). Of course, classics like Higurashi, Nana and Welcome to the NHK should hardly be overlooked. Finally, anime based on games, Utawarerumono, Kanon and Tokimeki Memorial ~Only Love~ would symbolize the changing times. Tokimeki Memorial signalling the loss of control Konami had on the genres while ushering Key Anime into the spotlight. 2006 is the most important year in anime history because of changes it made and brought about.

[animeets]

Daily Trio Overview

Sundays - The Day of the Sun, for those who shine brightly and illuminate the world around them. Sugiura Koharu (White Album 2), Shibuya Rin (The iDOLM@STER Cinderella Girls), Senjougahara Hitagi (Monogatari Series)

Mondays - The Day of the Moon, for those who characters who shine brightest under the dim illumination of the moon. Nishikino Maki (Love Live!), Shiba Miyuki (Mahouka), Kudou Mirei (Inou Battle)

Tuesdays - The Day of Fire, for those characters with tempers that burn everything to ash. Ayatsuji Tsukasa (Amagami), Takao (Kantai/Arpeggio), Yona (Akatsuki no Yona)

Wednesday - The Day of Water, for the cool characters who focus on their own goals throughout everything. Chelsea (Akame ga Kill!), Kisaragi Chihaya (The iDOLM@STER), C.C. (Code Geass)

Thursday - The Day of Trees, for the characters who support others in their goals. Tohsaka Rin (Fate/Stay Night), Nagakura Imari (Absolute Duo), Yuuki Asuna (Sword Art Online)

Friday - The Day of Gold, for characters whose worth and talents are far more than just money. Aoyama Nanami (Sakurasou), Aozaki Aoko (Mahoutsukai no Yoru), Katsura Hinagiku (Hayate no Gotoku)

Saturday - The Day of Earth, for down to Earth characters who are easy to relate to and cunning in their own way. Ogiso Setsuna (White Album 2), Endou Sarina (Star Driver), Odagiri Nene (Yamada-kun)

[animeets]

Spring 2015 Season: 3/4

Currently Watching:

Diamond no Ace: Season 2 (Daiya No Ace)

Dungeon ni Deai o Motomeru no wa Machigatteiru Darou ka? (DanMachi)

Fate/Stay Night: Unlimited Blade Works (UBW TV)

Grisaia no Rakuen (The Eden of Grisaia)

Gunslinger Stratos (GS)

High School DxD BorN (DxD BorN)

Kekkai Sensen (Kekkaisen)

Nisekoi:

Owari no Seraph

Plastic Memories

Shokugeki no Souma (Souma)

Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Comedy wa Machigatteiru. Zoku (OreGairu Zoku)

Yamada-kun to 7-nin no Majo (Yamada-kun)

Plan To Watch:

Arslan Senki

Ore Monogatari!!

So we’re about 3/4 through the spring season and I’ve watched most of the anime I was planning on seeing this season with the exception of the two in the plan to watch area. Overall, I think this season had a lot of comedy anime with a lack of darker tones that complement them. An overview of comedy that I’m watching:

DanMachi - While definitely humourous and light-hearted, this show is incredibly lackluster as there is nothing about it that sticks beyond the title. It does a great job of incorporating the MMO genre into a story, however, with titles like SAO, Accel World and Log Horizon having done so already it doesn’t stand out in any way. With nothing really standing out and nothing being horrible DanMachi gets a score of 6.

DxD BorN - I mean, it does things in DxD fashion. I generally rate anything of the Ecchi + Harem genre poorly because anything that requires the two combined rather than good storytelling and characters just doesn’t compare to anime that lack the Ecchi side. A great example is the World God Only Knows. DxD is usually one of the exceptions that manages to avoid being too reliant on the nature of the genres. This season however, has just been lackluster so it settles to a score of 5.

Nisekoi: - I’ve never been a huge fan of this series. For someone who’s been watching as long as I have, there is nothing about this anime that intrigues me at all. Again, it’s not bad by any means but it brings nothing new to the genre, but unlike the first season which had some great moments, this second season has been just filled with comedy, which rounds it out to a score of 6.

OreGairu Zoku (I don’t consider this comedy because it’s not really funny at all in my opinion)

Yamada-kun - This is my comedy anime of the season. I didn’t start watching this until last week and I’m glad I ended up watching it. With a detestable main character, female characters that bored me at the start, it looked like I would be in for another season of nothing to laugh at. It was definitely a more refreshing take to the Ecchi + Harem genre, similar to Strike the Blood and Campione!, two of my favourites in this genre. While it does fall short of the above two, it doesn’t really deserve a rating of 8 but it is a notch above the others in this genre.

Time for the rest:

Diamond no Ace: S2 - I rate anime like Detective Conan on different rating systems from the typical 1-2 season anime because the appeal for me is very different. Anime with large batch sizes are watched for their consistency and suspense build up. Detective Conan is the best in class for this, you can expect some of the same things in every episode and that once in a while you’ll get some plot build up that will really grip you. Diamond no Ace hasn’t failed so far at either, so it rounds out to a 7.

Fate/Stay Night: UBW - Also known as Shirou’s conversation. I’ve played the game on PS Vita, seen every season and adaptation because this is still my second favourite anime of all time. This adaptation adds the much needed flair of story telling that complemented the complex storyline, beautiful artwork and Typemoon character design. Rated at 9. Grisaia no Rakuen - I love Grisaia’s style of story telling. It gives you a thorough insight of a single character from their perspective of things. The biggest issue with this method is the nature of making other characters feel foreign and detached. It creates difficulty for the audience to feel empathy for everyone not currently in the story. This makes it lose a lot of the power that existed in the original. Overall 7.

Gunslinger Stratos - Gunslinger Stratos falls into the predicament that all anime of this apocalyptic genre fall into. The nature that the main character must save the world regardless of how hopeless it may seem. See Evangelion, Attack of Titan, Arpeggio of Blue Steel, Black Bullet, Devil Survivor - I think you get the idea. The better anime in this genre have moments of breath taking action followed by breaths of air where the explanation ensues. If the anime has too little explanation the viewer gets lost. If there’s not enough action, the viewer gets bored. Gunslinger Stratos does a fantastic job of telling a story and understanding characters but there’s just a void of action that makes it fall apart. Rated 6 cause without action you can’t really have a gunfighting anime. Kekkai Sensen - Where do I begin with this anime. It’s definitely a Studio Bones anime. It has everything I like in this kind of unique standout anime. A definitive style of story telling, an underlying plot that’s slowing building up. This is the Bones way of successful anime and it works for Kekkai Sensen. If the suspense actually turns into something I expect this to be an 8. If it doesn’t, it will flop to a 6.

Owari no Seraph - Ah, yay apocalyptic anime of the season version vampire. This is better than Gunslinger Stratos because it understands the requirement of action and explanation more. It however, has the same short falls as Attack on Titan, a plot that isn’t that complicated but takes too long to unravel in order to build unnecessary suspense. Good suspense will have you on your toes and excited. Bad suspense is a cliff hanger without good reason, where they spend half an episode doing nothing and then create a cliff hanger as opposed to so much happened and it’s not even over. Owari no Seraph is full of pointless cliff hangers which absolutely ruins the viewing experience and gets a 7.

Plastic Memories - Speaking of good use of suspense, Plastic Memories takes the award for the second best use of suspense in this season. The best of this season goes to OreGairu Zoku which I’ll expand on below. Plastic Memories starts off slow, letting you slowly fall into it before stepping on the gas and going hard. The story telling from multiple view points, the breaks to add comedic relief, and the non-stop emotion and action that follows is fluid. My biggest problem with this anime is the overuse of comedic relief and comedic relief characters because it harms the more serious overtones and questions the story asks. If not for those points, Plastic Memories would be a 9 easy.

Shokugeki no Souma - This is the best use of ecchi I’ve ever seen. It doesn’t use ecchi as the base of getting attention, rather it uses it to share another level of emotion and imagery. This by itself gets it set up for a ranking of 9. However, Souma has two fatal flaws. It’s a cooking battle anime that is basically story telling a story that just isn’t that interesting with a plethora of characters that are mostly meaningless. Like all shounen anime, when the story loses flavour and the characters are forgotten it just gets boring and Souma with probably the best first episode of any this season, has fallen off the fastest and as a result grounds out from a 9 to a 7.

OreGairu Zoku - I didn’t think Studio Feel could improve on the original. I was completely wrong. I despised the original OreGairu’s original way of story telling because it refused to show multiple perspectives of a single story and forced you into following around Hachiman, who I also didn’t like as a character but that’s a personal bias and a reason I don’t like the style because if you don’t like the character the story becomes harder to relate to.  Despite this, the detailed nature of explanation and well-paced stories and interactions are what made the original shine. Studio Feel finally did the one thing OreGairu needed, multiple perspectives - short as they may be, but they make a huge difference in the quality of the story that get’s shared to the audience. Add in suspense built by these multiple perspective and you get a masterful wait - week to week that is created by simple perspective changes, not by forcing time lengths. The increased number of perspectives bumps up OreGairu Zoku to a 9.

Overall Ranking:

Fate/Stay Night: Unlimited Blade Works: 9

OreGairu Zoku: 9

Plastic Memories: 8

Kekkai Sensen: 8

Yamada-kun: 7

Shokugeki no Souma: 7

Owari no Seraph: 7

Grisaia no Rakuen: 7

Diamond no Ace: 7

DanMachi: 6

Nisekoi:: 6

Gunslinger Stratos: 6

DxD: 5

[animeets]

Overview

Welcome to the anime side of the outeryang blog circle. I’ll be using this blog to share my thoughts on anime and write out things that supplement the main outeryang blog. Now I’m an avid anime watcher, having seen a ton of anime (Full MyAnimeList here, for recommendations use this one). I’ll be going through and sharing my thoughts on past anime, current anime and upcoming anime every so often so feel free to take a read and share your thoughts!