Well the spring anime season is now over and the summer season just started so it seems like a good time to make this post.

Spring Anime:

Ano Hana (I'm not typing out that whole name): I consider this to the be the best show of the season, even though it isn't as strong near the end as it is towards the beginning. Really I feel this show works better marathoned as I kind of feel it lose a bit of its impact when you had to wait a week between episodes.

Steins;Gate: Ties for the best show of the spring season and so far it looks like its going to be the best show of the summer season as well. This whole show is very well done, and when shit hits the fan it really hits the fan.

Hidan no Aria: I'll be honest, the only reason I watched this is because I had already read the translated Light Novels for the series and I was curious how JC Staff was going to handle the adaption. It really wasn't a very good show but it was a least entertaining every week. I still feel Riko is the best girl and its a bit of a shame that Aria has to be the main girl in the series.

Denpa Onna: SHAFT being SHAFT the series. This was a pretty good series even if I felt it dragged a little bit near the middle. I just didn't enjoy seeing the same few days repeated three times from different characters perspectives. Its a shame we have to wait six months for the 13th episode.

Dog Days: This ended up being one of my favorite shows this season and I really don't know why. Really this show isn't that great but I just found it really fun the watch week after week. I don't think I ever got bored watching this. The fact that its a Seven Arcs show with a male protagonist was also pretty amusing.

Astarotte no Omocha: I really wanted to drop this after the first episode, but I'm actually glad I didn't. This show was actually much better than that first episode leads you to believe. I really wasn't expecting it to be such a heartwarming series.

The World God Only Knows II: I'm a big fan of the manga so I've enjoyed mangalobe's adaption of the series. I'm really hoping that this gets a third season because the arcs just end up getting better from this point onward in the manga. I also feel how they did the last episode was pretty brilliant.

Summer Season:

Mayo Chiki: Reverse-trap can be pretty funny so I'll probably at least watch a few episodes of this. At the moment I'm hoping this show will just end up being a romantic comedy between the two leads, but I'm almost positive its going to be a harem comedy.

God's Notebook: This series has potential, I'll definitely being watching the next episode.

Baka to Test 2: I'm glad this got a second season. This isn't a deep series by any means, but it just comes across as :awesome to me.

Mawaru Penguindrum: This series is probably going to be pretty good. Its by the guy who did Utena after all.

Usagi Drop: Well this probably going to be the heartwarming series of the season. Due to having already read the manga I know how it ends and I'm hoping the anime adaption ends before they get to the timeskip.

Ro-Kyu-Bu: Obviously the best show this season :awesome . But seriously I'm kind of surprised I've been able to make it through two episodes of this. It probably helps I've made sure to only watch this show at 3 am when I'm already half asleep.

Well that's pretty much what I've watched these past two seasons. I may post more reactions later if I get around to watching more summer season shows/catching up on shows from past seasons.

p.s. Did you know Ro-Kyu-Bu can be read as 69 club. The more you know.

 

Oh, yeah, I almost forgot to post these....

http://yvoonmanga.files.wordpress.com/2011/05/neregate-com-summer-2011-anime-v4.jpg

http://mangaweekend.files.wordpress.com/2011/05/2011_anime_summer_guide.jpg

There isn't much I'm actually interested in. I saw the first episode of Blade and I wasn't impressed.

It's one of the seasons where I'm going to watch half of the first episodes to look which to follow.

Last season I only stuck with Ao no Excorcist.

 

I just watched the first episode of Blood-C, the new Blood the Last Vampire spinoff from Studio IG and Clamp. Now, I know it's only the first episode, but damn am I ever looking forward to the rest of it.

I stand convinced that no sequel, spinoff or remake will ever match up to the animated perfection of the original Blood the Last Vampire, so I'm not going to try to stack this new one up against it. I'm just going to love it for its own merits. And Blood+ was such a terrible attempt that it doesn't even bare talking about.

It's just one episode so far, but Blood-C has my recommendation.

 

In terms of story or art? Either way, that's a really low bar you're setting.

 

I'm a diehard fan of the original, so when Blood+ was released, I was disappointed on too many levels to name. Aniplex let me down on the artwork, and Studio IG fumbled the story something fierce. This new Blood-C, however, is in production with Clamp. Clamp.

So yes, I'm hesitant to like this from the first episode because of how badly Studio IG handled Blood+, but I like Clamp too much to not give this my recommendation. Flawed opinion, yes, but I still like it already.

(I'll probably end up eating my own words by the half way point, but we'll cross that bridge when we get there.)

 

I'm the complete opposite. I watched Blood: The Last Vampire due to the hype it seemed to have and was thoroughly disappointed. I approached Blood+ with minimal expectations but loved it.

Anyways, just watched the first episode of Blood-C (with high hopes) and I think was rather disappointed so far. The animation is poor. I mean, during the fight it wasn't too terrible, but at other times the laziness is just obvious and it gets to the point it just looks awkward. Not too much of a fan of Clamp character designs (And I'm fairly sure like Geass, Clamp are just providing the character designs, and nothing else?) and then, not too much of a fan of the characters either. The concept so far doesn't seem like it has a lot of potential either. Cinematography is weird at times - reminds me of old Flash movies in those scenes of her walking out of school.

But I'll withhold any final judgement until later. Blood+ I thought was fairly average until I was around 15 episodes in, and then I started loving it. Any idea how long Blood-C will be? MyAnimeList still has it as 'unknown'. I hope its not another 13 episode short that seems to be becoming more and more common amongst any anime that actually has a storyline and isn't just a moeblob.



I figure since it's the end of the season I'll also chuck down my recommendations from last season. Only two:

Deadman Wonderland - I'm surprised it didn't gain as much popularity as I thought it would. It was a great, fun anime, and season 2 (which there definitely will be) will be an awesome continuation. Awesomely executed - cinematography, animation and OST (I think the OST largely gives it a very different feel to many other anime, with an industrial type sound to it). At times think its biggest failing is being overly twisted for the hell of it. I mean, it is a twisted , but they do overdo it. Exciting story - especially when you get introduced to their special powers. 8.5/10

Stein's Gate - To be honest, found it rather average for the first 7 or so episodes. I pretty much watched it solely cause the main character is awesome and hilarious. But from about ep 9 I think the plot starts to really move. I do think the slower start is kinda necessary since it does provide a nice contrast for later events. Pumped to see where it goes from here. 7/10 (potentially go much higher, we're still only halfway)


Also saw C: Money of Soul and Possibility Control (decent, with a nice ending - despite the fact everyone else seemed to hate it. Nothing I'd recommend though. 7/10), Oretachi ni Tsubasa wa Nai (I honestly can't work out if wtf this anime is meant to be. Regardless, I still kinda enjoyed it. 5.5/10). I dropped Hidan no Aria, Denpa Onna, Moshidora and Hanasaku Iroha.

I also plan to watch Tiger and Bunny, which was highly recommended to me. Might check out Ao no Exorcist, Sket Dance and Ano Hana.


From this season I think I'll check out:

Blood-C
No-6
Mayo Chiki
Nuryarihyon no Mago Sennen Makyou
Dantalion no Shoka
Usagi Drop

Of course, also impatiently waiting the fansubbing of Black Lagoon OVA 5 (which was a 10/10 for me, with season 1 and 2 being 7/10) and Break Blade 6.

 

The overall story sucked, but at least they actually tried to give it one. The original was created for the sole purpose of being a tech demo for computer animation. As such, Production IG spent all of their money on the animation, and nothing at all when it came to creating a story for it.

There's also the difference in mediums to take into account; TV anime are not going to look as good as movies or OVA's since they have to stretch their animation budget to cover an entire season or more. So trying to compare the two versions of Blood on an animation level is doomed to failure from the start.

Unless you were disappointed in its aesthetics, not animation, in which case I agree with you 100%.

I didn't like Deadman Wonderland at all. I believe I mentioned this in the manga rec thread when this series was brought up, but where DW falls short for me is that it takes such an interesting premise and tries to turn it into a shounen fighting series. It could have been so much better if it was not written with a target demographic of young, teenage boys.

The art also bugged me, but really only because I kept seeing that twerp from Eureka 7 whenever I looked at the main character. Probably has something to do with the artist having worked extensively on the Eureka 7 manga prior to doing DW.

 

I guess that's what I liked about it. I've always been a fan of shounen fighting series, but most of the time while being addictive, you spend most of your time facepalming over fail characters, fail situations, overly cheesy dialogue and ridiculously long fights. They're always ridiculously addictive to me, and yet oh-so-annoying when you realize the failed potential.

Deadman manages to pull it off without *too much* of those annoying traits that you usually see in shounen. Just generally, I thought it was executed almost perfectly.

 

I have mixed feelings about DW, mainly because I picked up the manga after episode seven. The anime is a lot more about the combat then the manga is, sometimes that's good, but other times not so much. Wasn't a fan of how they glossed over most of the character's back stories, or how they made Ganta a complete pussy. I'm hopeful for a second season, but at the same time, I have no idea how they'll pull it off, since they didn't bother including a really important secondary character who's pretty much the catalyst for everything after this point. They could introduce her, but it'll feel kinda cheap.

 

I've been watching Gundam Wing for the first time since it aired on CN forever and a day ago, and I am surprised by how many similarities there are between it and G Gundam.

 

I've been hesitating at Katanagatari for a year, but finally came around to watching it after getting gg's BD release. It's the most awesome show I've watched this year, anime or otherwise. In the second place (another old one) would be FLCL, which got a BD release relatively recently. At only 6 episodes, a fucking blast.

Waiting for fansub of Break Blade 6. (Though I've only kinda watched 1-5 on pure inertia... the animation wasn't too fluid for what I expect from OVAs...)

Gonna check out Stein;s Gate soon. After I finish my download of Texhnolyze.

So, basically... didn't watch anything new?

 

This season is a bit weak. Bunny Drop is a nice fluffy slice of life show. I normally don't go for SoL shows, but it's pretty good so far in just an "aww" way. Mayo Chiki is interesting. I like the premise but so far it just seems like your basic ecchi/fanservice anime. I watched the first episode of Dantalian, not expecting all that much due to the stale tsundere lead (after Gosick and the new Kamisama no Memocho, among others) its getting a bit old, but I was surprised by how much I enjoyed it. Will probably continue with that one.

Gintama is, well, Gintama. It is my favorite long running anime and if you stopped watching early on, there's no reason to start watching S2. I started watching Kaiji S2, as I thoroughly enjoyed the first season, but then I went ahead and read the manga and so I'm not all that motivated to continue with it as I know what's going to happen. Sometimes that doesn't bother me but other times it kills my interest in the anime. Kamisama no Memocho is pretty average, and the female NEET lead reminds me a bit of Gosick's lead, but I like the fact that it's dealing with real issues in Japan (teenage prostitution in the first ep). I enjoyed the first episode of No. 6, but I got a very strong BL vibe from it. I've never watched a BL anime before and I'm not interested in that sort of thing, but I might continue with it if the 2nd episode engages me.

The #1 series so far this new season for me is Mawaru Penguindrum. This series is just off the wall wtf, and yet so fucking awesome. There are a few little hints of incest, but I'm not sure if it's going to lead anywhere. It's directed by the same guy who made Utena btw.

 

So chances are that it means the incest will go somewhere, if only to hang around in the background and just make us all feel uncomfortable.

Ikuhara is an amazing director, but he really needs someone to reign in his shenanigans; if you want a good comparison between Ikuhara with restrictions and one without, go compare the Utena movie (no restrictions) and the Utena TV series (with restrictions). Hopefully he has a producer on hand for Penguin Drum that can reign him in.

 

Kami-sama no Memo-chan seems interesting so far, it's about a detective service called neet, the head of which seems to be a 11/12 year old super genius hacker named Alice. It has this odd contrast of dark plotlines and the adorable little girl going for it, mixed up with weird humor.

Dantalian no Shoka also has my vote so far, but if the next few episodes aren't awesome I probably won't stick with it.

 

It's not called neet, it's a NEET detective agency.

 

Yeah, I guess it is pretty neat.

 

God dammit.



It's rather difficult to get by the raging homolust in No. 6, but I'm trying to. I love dystopia, and I really want to see where this one goes.

 

I just finished watching Mayo Chiki, it's cute, has decent action, and it's funny... So far, defiantly my favorite of the new ones.

 

The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya (for season two, the endless eight: after finishing the 2nd ep go to ep 9

Gai Rei Zero

Kuroshitsuji (the first season; I like to pretend that there wasn't a second)

Shiki

The Rebuild of the Evangelion series is pretty epic too (and I'm sure it's implied from all the people recing Eva - watch The End of Evangelion the movie)

Movies: pretty much all of Miyazaki's work and Tekkonkinkreet is pretty interesting too. Also the Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya.

 

I would recommend Ninin ga Shinobuden. It's not a serious anime, more a parody of lots of things. I found it very funny, though the humour is a little absurd.