I came across this AMV while browsing youtube and quite bored. I know the song comes from that Twilight thingamabob so I think this latest “AMV of the Day” will pull a tear or two from my co-founder Lisa Marie.
The latest chosen AMV is called “A Thousand Years” and it’s from YouTube user 93RokuStepperZ. It’s a simple romance-themed video that pretty much takes two of the most romantic and sappiest romance anime of the last couple years and melds it with the ballad by Christina Perri for that long-running sparkly vampire and his girlfriend series.
There’s no super bells and whistles in how the video was made. It’s just a well-edited AMV that focuses on the two couple from the two series. There’s Toyomi and Nagisa from Clannad and Clannad: After Story (BAWWWWWWWW) and then there’s Ryuuji and Taiga from Toradora.
One thing we won’t find in this AMV would be vampires, werewolves or any of that sort. Just moe anime and a tsundere shorty.
I’ve gotten to watch Black Lagoon once again and I must say that the more I watch it over and over the more I have put this anime series on my favorite list. It’s just an anime that hits all the right buttons for me. Hyper-kinetic action, loads and loads of gun play and the most diverse cast of psychotic, badass female characters ever. One of these said badass females is one Rosalita “Roberta” Cisneros who headlines the third season of the series.
“Careful What You Wish” is the latest AMV of the Day that shows this lonewolf former FARC assassin turned maid for one of Colombia’s ruling families as she goes on a warpath to avenge the killing of her master and protect his only son in the aftermath. The video was created by LasSamurai2011 and he does a great job of putting together the video to work hand in hand with Metallica’s “King of Nothing” track.
While some of the sequences look just a tad dark it still shows enough of how much a badass Roberta really is and in a series full of such character that’s an achievement in of itself. Fans of the anime know what mean and those who are interested in checking out the series should do so. It’s every action film from the 80’s multiplied to a factor of 1000.
For the first AMV entry for 2013 and the latest in a long series I’ve decided to go for nostalgia to dictate my choice instead of quality (though I will say the video does it’s job well in matching the song used). Anyone who grew up during the late 90’s and early 2000’s have heard, seen and/or obsessed over the Japanese pop-culture phenomenon simply called Pokemon.
I was already an adult and I was caught up in the hurricane that was Pokemon when it swept through the West in the late 1990’s. Hell, I pretty much played most of the different color editions of the game on the Game Boy and it’s subsequent handhelds. I’m even proud to say that my two favorite Pokemons were Pikachu and Togepi. But that’s a different matter altogether. Today it’s all about the AMV titled “Ash vs. Gary”.
The video uses the very fight-like song “Remember the Name” by Ft. Minor to highlight the Pokemon battle match between the two rivals. As we can see in the video the two use many different Pokemons in their collection to battle it out. Their battle lasts until they each just have one Pokemon left and it’s a sudden death match that many fans of the show fondly remembers. In one corner is Gary’s fully evolved Blastoise (which is the final evolved version of the starter Pokemon Squirtle) and in the other corner is Ash’s tempermental Charizard (the final evolved form of the starter Pokemon Charmander).
Really, there’s nothing left to say other than enjoy the video and take a glimpse into a nostalgic trip down my own memory lanes.
Anime: Pokemon
Song: “Remember the Name” by Ft. Minor feat. Styles of Beyond
I must admit that in 2012 I didn’t get to listen in full many new albums outside of soundtracks. My Fave five of 2012 Songs will reflect this fact, but still with the lack of variety in my past year’s listening habit I thought the songs I came up with for the list I still would’ve put on a much bigger favorite 2012 list if I had need to come up with one. Without further ado he are the Fave Five (though it’s more Fave Six but I decided to combine the first entry’s two as a tie).
The Fave Five starts off with a tie that comes from the same film. Both songs come from the soundtrack to The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. While the film may not have been up to some audiences’ high expectations the soundtrack itself by Howard Shore (and for “Song of the Lonely Mountain” as sung by Neill Finn) continued the high-quality of the Tolkien soundtracks which began with the original Lord of the Rings trilogy. “Song of the Lonely Mountain” is a much more folk rock addition to the soundtrack while the “Misty Mountains” was actually part of the film itself when the character of Thorin Oakenshield sings it with his band of dwarfs while at Bilbo Baggin’s hobbit hole in the beginning. Both songs so a great job of telling the story of the quest that begins with this first film in the new trilogy.
The theme song 2012’s Skyfall was a throwback to the classic James Bond theme song’s of the Sean Connery and Roger Moore Bond eras. In fact, I thought it’s one of the best theme songs the long-running spy thriller franchise has had these past 25 years. It helps that you have Adele singing the theme who seems to be able to hit the right proper emotional notes during the song. It’s really hard to think of Skyfall the film being as good as it is without making sure one mentions Adele’s theme for it. I’d take the leap and say that the song itself may even be better than the film itself.
Mass Effect 3 was the epic conclusion to what was this gaming generation’s version of the original Star Wars space opera. It was a story that spanned the galaxy with memorable characters, thrilling action and some very good writing. There will always be the vocal minority who seem to think the ending to the trilogy was bungled by the writers over ta BioWare. That’s a whole different debate altogether. One thing that doesn’t seem to bring out the pitchforks was Clint Mansell’s score work for the game and it all culminates with the song simply titled “An End, Once and For All” which in it’s extended version more than makes up for whatever deficiencies the ending it orchestrally-scored may have had.
Another game’s music makes itself to my Fave Five list and this time it’s my second favorite song for the year of 2012. It’s from Halo 4 and it’s a song that brought new life to the venerable franchise. It didn’t just make the end credits more than just memorable, but also surprised many fans of the franchise’s music since the song wasn’t composed by the franchise’s original music composer, Martin O’Donnell, but by Kazuma Jinnouchi. It’s the one song in 2012 that I must’ve listened to on repeat for hours on end and probably in the high hundreds by now. It’s a song that brings back memories of the scifi soundtracks of the 80’s. It’s a work that I easily can compare to the best that’s ever been composed by luminaries in the genre like John Williams, Alan Silvestri, Michael Giacchino and others.
What can I say. The song speaks for itself. How can one not say this was the best song for 2012.
The title I’m writing about today has been featured in an AMV of the Day post by site founder Arleigh in the past, and it’s one that I’ve been meaning to write about ever since its licensing announcement back in October. But with that month being a horror-centric month, and last month…well, I was just really lazy last month. However, today I’d like to give my personal recommendation to one of the current biggest hits to come out of Japan, Sword Art Online.
The premise of the show is this: In the future gaming is done by immersing your consciousness completely into the game with a headset that’s pretty much the kind of virtual reality that some of us dearly dream was real. All senses are simulated so you can even eat food in the game and it tastes and feels like you’re eating real food. The newest, most sought after game in this time period is an MMO called Sword Art Online (what a coincidence, because there’s this anime with the same name that’s really good too! They should watch it.) and it’s a very exclusive game. Only 10,000 copies are released to the general public so getting the privilege to own a copy is like a status symbol. The main protagonist in the series, Kazuto Kirigaya or Kirito as he names himself in the game, is not only one of the lucky few who got a copy, but he was also a beta tester for the game. When the game goes live, he and the rest of the 10,000 log in and begin playing. I’ll admit it’s kind of amazing that all 10,000 supposedly all logged in at roughly the same time, but this show does require a few suspensions of belief. Anyways, after playing for a few hours and training another person on how to play, Kirito attempts to log out only to find that there is no option to log out of the game. Then all players are force transported to the square of the starting town where they are stripped of their avatars and their true selves are shown to be in the game. Then the creator appears via hologram announcing to them all that they are now trapped in the game until someone manages to clear all 100 levels. The real downside to this? If you die in the game, you die in real life. If your NervGear (the headgear that brings the virtual world to life) is forcibly removed, you will die. The only way to get out of the game alive is to clear it. And thus starts the adventure for Kirito and the people trapped in SAO.
The first thing to say about SAO is that the backgrounds are absolutely gorgeous. This was obviously meant to be a big budget hit, and from character designs to backgrounds it sure doesn’t seem as if they went the cheap route. The boss battles are particularly noteworthy. This is one of the later boss battles, and this should give you an idea of the quality of the show, since often times the longer a show runs, the more likely the animators are to start cutting corners since their budget might be running low. This has not happened with SAO. (The subs are in spanish since I couldn’t find what I wanted in English, but you don’t really need to know what’s being said to appreciate the action)
Now I’m not big on playing MMOs myself. That whole teamwork thing isn’t for me, but this does give a good representation on what some of the tougher boss battles in MMOs are like. Now just imagine that your life was actually on the line and you can get a sense of the intensity in the battle.
Now, for the characters, your mileage may vary. Personally, I’ve liked the majority of them, even the “bad guys” so to speak, as they’ve done a good job of keeping them interesting. The main two are Kirito and Asuna, the girl in the picture and in that video, but there are others that make regular appearances, and then we also have one time showings from characters that become fan favorites like Silica Fett. Ok, she’s just called Silica, but she has the Boba Fett syndrome where she makes a lone appearance yet becomes a huge fan favorite. A couple seem like they were pointless additions, but mostly they’re there to show Kirito’s progression from uncaring loner to basically the hero of the game. This has led some detractors to label him as an MMO Jesus, in that he goes around saving people for no real reason other than to perhaps make himself feel better for past failings, but I liked seeing him grow up as it were and actually become a better person through the game.
As I write this, the show is still ongoing, so I’m taking a risk in recommending it. The show has switched gears a bit, and while I’m fine with where it’s going, since I haven’t read the light novels that this is based on, which I think are still ongoing themselves, the ending could very well shit the bed. At the very least it’s likely that the animation staff will have to make up their own ending, and even when that has the approval of the original creator, it tends to have mixed results. The tonal shift from the first season to the second is a bit jarring, and it kind of takes you out of the world that it worked hard to craft, but from what I’ve seen of the second season thus far it should transition well.
The musical score is also quite fantastic. It is largely composed by Yuki Kajiura, whom Arleigh and I had the pleasure to see in concert with Fiction Junction at this year’s Anime Expo. Each piece is well crafted to fit the mood of the scenes, from grand epic pieces to fit major battles, to slow paced, gentler sounds to complement quiet, everyday life. Music is essential in setting the proper mood in shows, and this is done beautifully here.
A major concern I have is from the licensing side. It’s been announced for release in the US & Canadia by Aniplex of America, and their prices tend to run a bit on the high side. I recently purchased Bakemonogatari from them, and that cost $150 for half as many episodes as SAO is going to be. The only comparable release that they’ve done as far as episode count would be their Blue Exorcist release, and that was only released on 4 DVDs which can be had for $100 now. But, at the risk of sounding like a video snob, this is a release that demands a blu-ray version. With Japan constantly crying about reverse importation, either it’s going to be a DVD only release or it will be an incredibly expensive BD release, possibly even along the lines of the infamous $700 Fate Zero release. Only time will tell on this, but fans will just have to cross their fingers that our Japanese overlords will be reasonable. Regardless, if the show can keep up the kind of energy and drama that it presented in its first half, then I’ll be hard pressed to pass by the eventual release.
In honor of site anime editor pantsukudasai56 finally getting his Bakemonogatari blu-ray set it’s more than proper to have the latest “AMV of the Day” come from that very anime series.
“Just Can’t Get Enough” is not just the title of the AMV but the name of the song used for the video. I’m not a huge fan of The Black Eyed Peas but this song seemed quite appropriate in focusing the video on the harem and romance aspect of the series. Bakemonogatari pretty much a harem series but with some heavy supernatural themes to it. The video shows some of that especially when Black Hanekawa (cat girl) appears, but mostly it sticks to the main lead in Araragi paired up with the different girls he comes across in the series.
The video’s creator, joserbuitrago1, does a very good job in syncing up the lyrics with some of the anime lip movements to make it seem characters like Araragi, Senjougahara and Hanekawa are singing the song themselves. I’ve noticed that AMV either just avoid trying to sync up the lyrics with the anime or do so to great result. This video is of the latter variety.
Anime: Bakemonogatari
Song: “Just Can’t Get Enough” by The Black Eyed Peas
The newest “AMV of the Day” entry is one that will give site contributor and anime/manga editor pantsukudasai a smile. It’s a video for one of this year’s newest anime series in Japan and one that’s growing in popularity with each passing day.
“Our Miracle” is a video dedicated to the anime series Sword Art Online and it uses the song “Miracle” from the hard rock group Shinedown. This series has been quite a surprise in that it’s an anime about a fictitious MMORPG of the same. It’s one that I’ve only started watching but I can understand why so many people have been raving about it. It has action, romance and comedy in equal amounts and it actually has quite a story about loyalty and perseverance. Not to mention that it’s pretty dark for a series that’s a visual feast to the eyes with its animation that goes for bold and bright colors and brightly lit settings.
The video itself tries to focus on the romance between it’s two main leads in Kirito and Asuna but at the same giving equal focus on the action that should attract the shonen crowd. If I had to pick a type of AMV this one goes under it would be as an action video and it definitely makes a strong case for action fans to check out. The romance and comedy are great side bonuses for those willing to take them on.
I have to give it up to the video’s creator, FedeBankai, for making a very clean video that doesn’t go for too much excessive video effects. I do like the paneling effect that makes some of the scenes transition from motion to static images on paper. He’s made the best Sword Art Online AMV I’ve seen yet and has raised the bar for those wanting to use the same series to create their AMV around.
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.
Through the Shattered Lens 