Final Thoughts: Winter 2012

Final Thoughts Winter 2012

As time goes on, another anime season comes to an end. Funny story, the site where I usually watch all the new shows for a season went down, I assume not surviving the fall of Megaupload. So I had to scramble to find any sites that would still have all the shows I had been watching, fearing I would have had to drop all the good shows I had come to love this season. Turns out I was fine, and all the shows I did end up dropping I realized I was going to drop anyway. So anyway, to the reviews! Like last season, there are a few shows going on through this season, so I will give a quick update on what I am watching. I’m still keeping up with Hunter X Hunter, it is a great show keeping up really well with the manga. I am a huge fan of the manga, so I am impressed with how they are adapting it so far, and now that they are past the Exam arc, the real story is going to start, and I am so excited.  I’ve been watching Tokiko too, and while I haven’t been reading the manga, I am still excited for the next step of the grand food adventure. Poyopoyo Kansatsu Nikki, a short three minute show about a round cat, has stolen my heart and has quickly become my favorite show if its type. It is just a perfect three minute show, great characters, nothing complicated, and not only one joke, which is really impressive. Mouretsu Pirates, the one with the pirates in mini-skirts, is by no means perfect. But it is fun, and I really like the characters and the art design is still really fun. I am also watching Sket Dance, a show that hits that perfect niche of anime for me. Fun characters, good comedy, and just good people doing good things, everything about the show just makes me smile, or in the case of its more serious and somber moments, tear up. And then there is Knight in the Area, a fun soccer anime, which seems to be something I am slowly getting into. And now, for my final thoughts of the shows that ended this season!


Chihayafuru- This show was surprisingly good. I didn’t think a show about an old memory game could be so intense, so emotional, and still make me laugh. I am happy that my earlier fears, of half this show being in flashback, was completely unfunded. This is a show I really want to get a second season, especially with the way it ended. It ended like it was just a normal year or so in the life of the characters, without Chihaya winning the title of the Queen, without the personal arcs of the characters being completed, yet with no real promise of more to come, other then a  new school year starting. It kind of depresses me that a show this good might not get a second season. But there is hope. It is a fun show, a good character piece, and I highly recommend it.

Phi Brain: Kami no Puzzle: This was a show I was actually considering dropping when I had my little fake crisis I mentioned above. And I am glad I didn’t. I liked the whole solving a puzzle an episode gimmick, the characters were fun, especially my favorite red headed character, Gammon. I always have a soft spot for secondary main characters, like Matt from Digimon. Actually that basically describes most of the characters, they were all someone, from some season of Digimon, at least all the important characters. The show had a lot of problems though. There were art problems and characters being off model so much that even I noticed. The story went coocoocachoo bananas at some point, leading to the possible destruction of the earth, through puzzles. And it just become repetitive for a good bit before the end. But I still had fun with the show. I still think it should have been a more episodic adventure, with an over arching plot in the background. But I still would recommend it, at least the first half. This show is actually getting a new season, right away. But it counts as a second season, so I am still reviewing, and recommending it.

Mirai Nikki: Future Diaries basically almost ruins this list, because at the time of me writing this list, it is still going on, with two episodes left. So if those two episodes basically ruin everything, take what I am saying with a grain of salt. But beyond that, I love this show. It is a perfect cat and mouse game, with almost every main character being incredibly developed and given deep, rich stories. And the characters that don’t get developed as deeply are still great characters with what they are given, I.E. Henshin Guy, or number 11. Yuki is a character that has had great development though out the story, and he has really come into his own towards the end of the series. Deus Ex Machina was a surprisingly adult and flawed character, for a god of all time a space, and Yuno… well Yuno is fucking crazy. Seriously, even if the last two episodes are the worst thing in existence, even if it doesn’t answer anything, and literally smacks me in the face, and insults my mother to my face, I would still recommend this show, only so that you would understand how crazy Yuno is. Almost every scene she is in steals the show, because you never know what is going on in her head. Is she going to try to stab that guy for crazy reason, or is she going to fawn over Yuki and kidnap him…again. And I am sure both happened at least once. Seriously, even if the last two episodes suck, watch his show.

Recorder to Randoseru: One joke, the elementary school student looks about 25, so everyone thinks he is a pedophile for hanging around with children, who are really around his age. That kid will be so messed up by the time he reaches high school. It is a little fun, but like I said, Poyopoyo is much better, and really over shadows this show. It is also getting a second season right away, like Phi Brain. I will probably keep watching it, but really it is kind of loosing its charm. It really needs to start mixing it up a bit.

Daily lives of High School Boys: There are slice of life shows. There are parodies of slice of life. And then there is Nichijbros. God I love this show. It is perfect, or at least as near perfect as a show like this can get. It is, on one side, a perfect parody of every moe girl, high school anime in existence, perfectly dissecting and even using the same motifs and tropes. On the other side, it is a completely accurate life of high school boys. I did some of the stuff they did, hell I still do. When I hang out with friends, we still act like idiots, talking about simple things as if they were really serious, telling dumb stories and the like. This show was near perfect for me, two parts Gintama, three parts parody, two parts hitting way to close to home, and four parts absurdist comedy. I cannot recommend this show enough. And the best part? It looks like there will be a second season. While the ending made it so I would have been fine if there were no second season, the fact that there is a second season makes it even better, and makes me want to see these characters come back even more.

New Prince of Tennis: It is Prince of Tennis, but new. Seriously though, it is a good season for the show over all. The intense training is cool to watch, the tennis is classic PoT, which it is basically Dragon Ball Z but with tennis, and the characters are as bombastic and over the top as usual, giving Atobe probably one of the fun-est episodes out of the bunch. If you like PoT, you will like this. And because it is PoT, there will probably be a second season, so be on the watch for the continuing adventures of bishies playing super tennis. I know I will.

Inu X Boku SS: I did not cut this show. And I am so glad that I didn’t. It was a surprisingly fun character piece about a bunch of people, living together, just trying there best. Each character was incredibly interesting, or in the very least, funny. And the romance between Rirrchiyo and Miketsukami is really one of the best romances I have seen in a while. It is honest, well as honest as two characters wrapped in lies and a pathological inability to be honest with each other, much less themselves. The side chaaracters were all very well done, but the guy who stole the show was Kagerou Shoukiin, a man who can classify anything as either masochistic or sadistic. I admit, now when I’m bored now and again, I will start doing this, because it is a great way to kill time, and make yourself laugh stupid. This show really surprised me, especially with how good the last episode was. So I totally recommend it.

Brave 10: Oh god Brave 10. Brave 10 looks great, has great fighting, and some really colorful characters. The story is completely dumb and honestly annoys me. There were suppose to be 10 braves, as the title indicates. They reached all ten in episode 8 or 9. They had all ten braves for less then a whole episode. Oh good gods, you have no clue how annoying that was. For a brief second, the show was right on track, and then *BAM* nooooooooope! Oh god this show was so dumb, it was nothing but spectacle. Which can be fun, and fine, but this show did nothing to help that. If this show gets another season, then it might become good, because as a 24 episode series, it could have been good. The first season should have been the gathering of the characters, setting up the over arching conflict along with the individual conflict between the ten Braves, and maybe a small conflict which would set up the plot of the second half. If in fact that is what Brave 10 did, and I just didn’t realize it, then I will watch the next season. But if not, and this is only one season, the it is a dumb show. If you want to watch something that is both dumb, and has stupid ninja magic fights, then watch Brave 10. If not, watch something better.

I did drop a few shows this season. First was Papa no Iu Koto o Kikinasai! could have kept me interested, but it was just no Usagi Drop, so the bad just outweighed the good. It might still be good, but I dropped it. Kill Me Baby should have been one of those three minutes an episode show. It wasn’t that funny for a whole half hour, it got tiresome even. I love shows like this, but Kill Me Baby was not a very fun slice of life. And then there is High School DxD. At some point in the early half of the show, I thought they were hinting at something, one thing that would have made me watch this show to the end. The main character was seeming to become less perverted, maybe even more mature. I thought, for a split second, he was growing. And if they did that, it could have been a silly, dumb, but not horrible show. But then the main character found a slime monster that ate the cloths of all the girls. I stopped watching at this point. It is a dumb, fan service show. It does not need to be watched.

Well that was the winter season. Which means the spring season is coming up. I will have my first thoughts soon. But, until next time, have fun watching.