When I first returned to watching anime and reading manga a little over 4 years ago one of the series that I really enjoyed and continue to enjoy since has been the series from the art duo of Peach-Pit. This series about living dolls and one hikikomori boy named Jun Sakurada reminded me that anime wasn’t just cute and disposable entertainment with simple writing. This series wasn’t just cute to look at, but had writing that struck a balance between comedy, drama and, for a series about dolls, it was dark and melancholy.
Rozen Maiden is the name of the series.
Now comes word that the manga that is still on-going will be receiving a new series (already two seasons and two OVA’s have been released) after almost 6 years of no new anime content. There’s no word of when the new Rozen Maiden series will premiere in Japan and whether it’ll get licensed for a release in North America, but just the news that the project has been green-lit should delight fans of the series. For one thing it’ll mean more desu.
Time for a new “AMV of the Day” and the first one that features the recently licensed supernatural horror (w/ some romance) anime series Mirai Nikki aka Future Diary.
“Dead End” is the title of the AMV and it features the two leads of the series. There’s the loner Yuki Amano and Yuno Gasai. The latter being the pink-haired girl who seems to be quite smitten with the quieter Yuki. The video itself doesn’t spoil much about the main story in the series, but it does give a hint as to the peculiar relationship between these two people. The loner (not hikikomori-level but getting there) and the slightly unhinged yandere.
This video would’ve been perfect for the horror-themed October, but alas I had just recently found this little gem which uses the song “You Make Me Feel” by trip hop group Archive. The song itself fits in well with the scenes chosen and edited together for the video. It really highlights the soft and extreme nature of Yuki and Yuno’s relationship as the song goes from hard trip hop bass line beats to the band’s frontwoman’s ethereal-sounding vocals.
So, much props to the video’s creator, Himura Kenshin, for this well-made AMV and for creating a video that could easily act like a trailer for the series.
Two posts in one month? What sort of madness is this? Well, I’ve been drinking a lot, so makes sense that I should attempt to ramble here where I have free reign to do so. But never mind that, what’s important here is that in addition to my aforementioned Another, if you’re going to watch another horror anime this month, you should give serious consideration to Hellsing Ultimate.
Now, let’s be clear on one important fact. I’m talking about the OAV series, as opposed to the TV series which came out 3 years prior to the much better OAV series. The main problem with the TV series was that it came out when the manga was proving to be popular, however, Kouta Hirano was a very slow writer. In fact, the manga was only a 10 volume series, yet it ran from 1997 until 2008. For the math challenged among us, that’s 11 years to release 10 volumes of manga. To give you all a very relevant comparison, another series that I’ve wrote about, One Piece, also started in 1997. To date, One Piece has produced 67 volumes. Even if we say that Eiichiro Oda is a freak of nature, most normal mangaka would produce three times what Kouta Hirano did in the same amount of time. The point being that the original TV series came out early on in the run of the manga, so the ending has absolutely nothing like the manga. Now, the OAV series was able to take its time and wait on the source material. Hence, why I’m insisting that if you watch any Hellsing show, you should make it the OAV series. It’s much more faithful to the manga, and while that doesn’t mean the TV series is bad, when compared against the original it just doesn’t hold up.
So, the long and short of Hellsing is that vampires are real. Very real. So what is your average person to do against such a threat? Don’t expect your average army to save you. Oh no, what you need is what the British government has. You need the Hellsing Organization. What makes the Hellsing Organization able to handle these freaks of nature better than your average army? Well, they have themselves a trump card known as Alucard. Anyone that has ever played a Castlevania game should know that name, but if you don’t, well then beware because I”m about to drop a very obvious spoiler on you. See, Alucard is actually Dracula backwards. GASP! So, now do we understand why the Hellsing Organization is badass? But Alucard is not the sort who cares to do all the work himself. Not that he can’t, just he’s not above recruiting those in whom he sees potential. And doesn’t every master want a pupil? That’s largely why he “recruits” Seras Victoria as his student by turning her into a vampire as well. In the TV series, Seras is shown almost as the main protagonist, while in the OAV series she shares the spotlight with Alucard and their boss, Integra Hellsing.
But it’s no fun if the protagonist is unbeatable and has no rival. Well, enter Father Anderson. Not only is he opposed to Alucard, but his group is entirely opposed to the whole Hellsing Organization. See, the Hellsing Organization basically represent the Anglican Church, while Father Anderson represents the Catholic Church. But this isn’t some regular human that miraculously is able to hang with a vampire. Oh no, Father Anderson has a few tricks up his sleeve. I could go on, but I’d say this video best sums up what kind of man he is.
But all that is just a taste of what’s to come. A huge part of the divergence between the TV series and the OAV is that the overall villain is not really described in the TV series. In the OAV, we find out that who the Hellsing Organization is ultimately fighting is not the Catholic Church as was hinted at this that video, but rather remnants from the Nazi party. Yes, if the Nazis had access to this kind of army, World War II might have turned out vastly different. Make no mistake though, this in no way tries to make the Nazi party out to be cool. Every person involved with the Nazis are batshit insane. It’s hard to say that there’s a “good guy” here, but certainly the Nazis are not them. But isn’t that the worst kind of villain? The ones who are fully aware that what they’re doing is pure evil and they just plain don’t care? That’s exactly how the Nazis here are portrayed. They’re not supposed to be misguided idealists, or innocents brainwashed against their will. No, they know what they’re doing, what they represent, yet they don’t care. They love it and embrace it, and they are shown to be completely nuts. And frankly, that’s the only way this could work, because Alucard and the Hellsing Organization themselves are not, nor are they trying to be, paragons of virtue. I mean, they rely on the power of vampires, and while Seras occasionally has some qualms about what she does, Alucard never cares if so called innocents are killed in the pursuit of his enemies. The entire lack of caring for human life makes it very difficult to label any one group as good or evil.
So, I’ll readily admit that as far as “Oh hell, I just wet myself” type of horror goes, this doesn’t really fit the bill. But really, do most people consider Dracula to be a horror movie? Most would. This is in the same vein as that. It’s horror in that “Look at all these people being slaughtered, isn’t that horrible?” sort of way, and not in the freak you out sort. The fact remains that this is a very well written anime. Also, a fun fact is that this shares a link with another manga/anime, High School of the Dead. It may not be readily apparent, but look at the character names in HSotD and then look at the name of the author of Hellsing. See if there are any similarities.
All in all, Hellsing is a very entertaining show, and it could at times be considered gore porn more than a horror anime. But, there’s little doubt that either way it’s definitely an anime worth watching.
Yesterday site anime and manga contributor pantsukudasai56 posted his anime horror post for the month be recommending to everyone to watch the anime horror series Another. Using that as inspiration I’ve chosen the latest “AMV of the Day” by picking an AMV that uses that very series as the foundation for the video.
I’ve still have to find time to watch the series, but I know that Another is a horror anime that seems to have reached cult-status and beyond since it’s release earlier this year. Unlike pantsu here I do enjoy lots of anime horror but I will agree that they’re not in the same realm as mahou shoujo and slice-of-life series in terms of consistent quality. The last horror anime that I thought to be very good was Gakuen Mokushiroku (better known as Highschool of the Dead) but even that series earns much of it’s popularity due to it’s excessive (I thank Zoidberg Jesus for it everyday) use of fanservice shots.
With this AMV we get one from a high-quality horror anime and also paired up with one of the music industry’s preeminent producers of musical scores from Two Steps From Hell. This time around AMV producer AnimeFanOtaku123 uses that groups song, “Am I Not Human?”, to be the score for the chosen scenes from Another to complete the video. In fact, AnimeFanOtaku123 does such a great job with this AMV that one could easily say that it works perfectly well as a trailer for the series if one didn’t think it was an AMV to begin with.
I’ll probably have one or two more horror-related AMV’s before the end of the month, but this is a good choice for this month..
Being the time of year that it is, I felt I should stay on the horror theme for my rare contribution. Last year I presented to you all my thoughts on the Higurashi series. This year I’m focusing on an anime that came out at the beginning of this year by relative newcomer studio P.A. Works called Another.
Horror anime are rather difficult to do well. That’s because unlike with live action, you are acutely aware that what is happening is not real. Sure, with live action if you sit back and look at most of the horror shows, you can’t necessarily take them seriously, but at least for me there’s a difference in my mind between watching something with real live people in it, and watching 2D drawings moving. So, horror anime either try to pretend they’re still live action and hope you can immerse yourself in them despite it obviously not being real, or they just go for the crazy, over the top exaggerated sequences with lots of blood and gore and just hope the mood feels right. Another takes the second approach. It’s not a constant bloodbath, but it seems to take much delight in coming up with the craziest, most unrealistic deaths it can think of. I think of it almost like an animated version of the Final Destination films. I’ll try and avoid too many spoilers here, but the first death we see should give you an idea of just how crazy and over the top they can get.
So, the basic premise of the show is that many years ago a student in class 3-3 died during the school year. Some classmates, unable to really deal with his death decided to pretend that he was still alive. Soon the rest of the class, including the teachers joined in. This was all well and good, except that when they took their class photos, the student who was supposed to be dead appeared in the photo. Since that time, class 3-3 has been like a portal to the afterlife, allowing the dead to come back and join the class. This has resulted in class 3-3 always having one extra person in it, although during the time which it occurs nobody is aware who the extra person is. They know there is one, but their memories have been altered so that the extra person seems like they’ve always been there. Also, the person who is dead, or the Another, also is unaware that they are dead. Fast forward 20 some years and we come to where the story starts, with transfer student Koichi Sakakibara joining class 3-3. There he meets the girl with the eyepatch, Mei Misaki. However, the rest of the class seems to not acknowledge her existence. The reason for this is revealed later on, but since it’s a mildly important plot point, I’ll leave that up to the readers to watch and see for themselves.
The character designs and the attention to detail in this show are fantastic, as is pretty much par for the course with P.A. Works. The character designs were based on concepts by Noizi Ito, who’s probably best known for her work as the illustrator for the Haruhi Suzumiya novels. What’s also par for the course for a P.A. Works show is that it meanders a bit and almost gets lost in the middle. We’ll set aside the ridiculousness of the deaths because this show isn’t trying to be ultra serious. It’s not going for the camp appeal, but it is using the gore as a sort of fanservice for people who are into that sort of thing. Don’t get too attached to any secondary characters, because there are a ton of deaths in this show. I’ll admit, one or two of the deaths did sadden me a bit, mainly because I liked that particular character and had hoped that they’d survive the curse. This particular class year seems to be extra unlucky, since they showed previous class records and there didn’t seem to be quite as many deaths from the curse as there was in this year.
A complaint that was tossed around when the show finished was that the identity of the Another, which is revealed at the end, was too difficult to figure out. Much like with The Sixth Sense, all the clues are shown once their identity is revealed, and there are quite a few red herrings thrown in there to keep you off the track, but it’s certainly possible to figure out who it is. I’ll say that I was wrong in who I thought it was, but at least my guess wasn’t eliminated until the very end. In fact, I largely suspect that the person whom I thought it was was who the creators wanted us to think was the Another from the get go. In that aspect, I can only tip my hat to them and say they did a good job in getting me to dance to their tune.
All in all, love it or hate it, P.A. Works deserves a lot of credit for not just sticking with a single genre of anime and trying something different to diversify. How true they were to the source material, I’m not entirely certain as I have not read the novel, written by Yukito Ayatsuji however I can say that if I see that P.A. Works is doing another horror anime, I’ll certainly be tuning in. The ride may be a little rocky in the middle, but it’s still a fun ride.
This particular tune had stuck itself in my head all week and I finally figured out who sang the song. Maroon 5 is a band that I would consider as being part of this new generation of pop rock. That’s not to denigrate the band or anything. I like them well enough and when they release a new single it’s usually one that’s quite catchy which makes them big hits for the band. It’s the use of one of their songs that the latest “AMV of the Day” uses to some good effect.
“Moves Like Jagger (Anime Mix)” is the latest AMV and one produced by one xXxKrazyKookiexXx and one that uses scenes from a cornucopia of anime series. It’s a video that’s simple and straightforward in that the editor tries (and succeeds) in syncing the lyrics being sung to lip movements in the scenes chosen. Even the type of scenes picked fits the song well with all of them characters dancing, singing or doing both.
DxXxKrazyKookiexXx has other AMV’s, but this is one that I’ve latched onto as a favorite of this particular producer and just like the song used in the video this AMV is just as catchy and fun. It is also quite fan service heavy which means NSFW as a word of warning.
Anime: Macross Frontier, Nyan Koi, Needless, Baka to Test, Seitokai Yakuindomo, Princess Lover, Kampfer, Highscool of the Dead, Sekirei, Sora no Otoshimono, Asobi ni Ikuyo, Hyakka Ryouran Samurai Girls, Ladies vs Butlers, Bakemonogatari, Naruto, Chaos Head, Uta no Prince Sama, Melancholy of Haruhi Suziyama, Rosario+Vampire, Teppo Tengen Gurren Lagann
Song:“Moves Like Jagger (Radio Edit)” by Maroon 5 feat. Christina Aguilera
After people see this scene they will think I’m either crazy or a glutton for heartache for loving this scene. It’s hard to disagree with that statement. There’s a reason why I love this scene from the anime series Clannad After Story and it has less to do with the tone of the scene, but a major reason why anime is not just for kids or about boobs, tentacle rape and all the other things adults in the Western media dismiss the art form for.
This scene from Clannad After Story happens between the series’ main lead in Tomoya who has now come to the realization that he must now make amends to the daughter he left behind to be cared for by his wife’s family. It’s a powerful scene that has brought many to tears from young teen girls to grown-ass men who probably bawled more than the former. One doesn’t even have to have seen the previous season to this anime or any episodes leading up to this scene. The moment itself has enough of a backstory that one cannot help but get caught up in the moment. It’s also a scene that does a great job of emphasizing that bond between parent and child even when the former hasn’t lived up to their responsibilities.
I think if more people watched anime like Clannad After Story their opinions of anime would change for the better and see it in a new and positive light.
It’s quit an early Thursday morning and I just thought to pick a brief but very interesting piece of AMV as the latest “AMV of the Day”.
It’s actually called a MAD video. A type of fan-made video very popular in Japan where fans take an audio clip from a favorite anime (or even a non-anime) and splice it together with piece of music and try to match the dialogue with the beats and tempo of the song. This particular MAD is by creator called fillin and take the comedic way the Bakemonogatari character of Mayoi Hachikuji always stutters the name of the series’ lead in Araragi.
The song used is the Moogle’s Theme from the Final Fantasy V soundtrack. The video pretty much works perfectly as Mayoi’s stuttering of Araragi’s name matches the tempo and melody of the song perfectly. One thing that’s clear is that this video is quite addictive to watch since it loops and plays again once it finishes. I think I watched and listened to it for almost an hour straight and would’ve continued longer if sleep hadn’t called.
I would say that the AMV producer who has shown up on this “AMV of the Day” feature the most has to be tehninjarox. His videos rarely turn out to be misses and even the ones I don’t gush over still end up being very well done. It’s no surprise that one of his latest videos was chosen to be the latest AMV profiled.
“Troll of Hearts” is one of his latest and it manages tomake use of Rick Astley’s now classic and over-memed song, “Never Gonna Give You Up”, with the harem anime series The World God Only Knows. This video manages to make the anime series’ main lead, Keima Katsuragi, come off much more committed and romantic than the series really lets on. For those saying I just spoiled the anime shouldn’t worry. The World God Only Knows is less about drama and emotional growth and more the comedic side of a young man so obsessed with dating sims game that he’s forced by Hell to use those same gaming skills to try and romance real “3D girls” instead of 2D virtual ones he seems to prefer.
I know that the Rick Astley song has become the butt of many a joke and parody video. This AMV doesn’t change yet the lyrics fit in well with how tehninjarox (aka Shin) edited the scenes from the series. If there was one thing which keeps me from making this latest AMV pick as one of my all-time favorites it would be the length of the video itself which is under 2 minutes and doesn’t make use of the song’s total running time. It’s a little nitpick really since the AMV was something done for an AMV contest that didn’t require he use the whole song. The fact that he was able to place 1st even with a truncated video just goes to show the impact the video had with those judging.
News that should make fellow site writer and contributor pantsukudasai56 very happy just came down the pipeline. According to Anime News Network the shonen series High School DxD has been given the greenlight for a second season.
While details about this second season has been, for the moment, quite sparse the fact that the season is now in production means that it’s not just a promise of one, but a guarantee that more harem hi-jinks involving the clueless Issei Hyodo and the beautiful, albeit demonic, girls of his high school. This is a series that’s definitely more about comedy than anything serious and/or thought provoking. Then again one can only survive on dramatic and deep anime for so long. Some levity needs to be mixed in with the dark and High School DxD certainly delivers in that front.
The popularity of the series (and the new season should get quite a welcome from its fans) also stems from the fact that it is a harem anime that also involves some very ecchi (fan service) moments. While this type of anime doesn’t appeal to everyone it still attracts a huge number of anime fans.
There’s no word when the new season will air, but until then I’m sure pantsukudasai56 will be anticipating ew stuff from his favorite character on the show: Koneko Toujou.
Through the Shattered Lens 