Anime and Manga - New Season

[Bartimaeus]

16 minutes ago, Sarex said:

That one is pure nostalgia.

I wanted to like it more, especially as it's one of the very few titles I listed there that is both longer and presented in a nice high definition transfer (contrast that to the "Darkness of the Moon, Shadow of the Sea" OVA that I mentioned liking in the previous post, which was only available on a fairly miserable VHS transfer), but I just didn't really find it clicking for me. Characters weren't very interesting or likeable, and I found myself pretty checked out on the seemingly generic fantasy story from pretty much episode 1. But at least it's finally off my list now after years of being stuck there. Also was good to confirm that the Tenchi Muyou series certainly isn't for me either, so I can strike all of that as well.

Edited November 18 by Bartimaeus

[Sarex]

3 minutes ago, Bartimaeus said:

I wanted to like it more, especially as it's one of the very few titles I listed there that is both longer and presented in a nice high definition transfer (contrast that to the "Darkness of the Moon, Shadow of the Sea" OVA that I mentioned liking in the previous post, which was only available on a fairly miserable VHS transfer), but I just didn't really find it clicking for me. Characters weren't very interesting or likeable, and I found myself pretty checked out on the seemingly generic fantasy story from pretty much episode 1. But at least it's finally off my list now after years of being stuck there.

I would agree with you. My good feelings on it are probably only nostalgia glasses as it's one of the first anime I ever watched. Kind of in the same basket as Vampire Hunter D. I think there is even a series for RoLW... yep, just checked. I kind of remember even at the time it being lesser than the movie.

[Sarex]

For some reason I though there was a movie for it. I must have mixed it up with the OVA. At this point I don't remember which one I liked more. Maybe I dare to rewatch it.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

13 minutes ago, Bartimaeus said:

I wanted to like it more, especially as it's one of the very few titles I listed there that is both longer and presented in a nice high definition transfer (contrast that to the "Darkness of the Moon, Shadow of the Sea" OVA that I mentioned liking in the previous post, which was only available on a fairly miserable VHS transfer), but I just didn't really find it clicking for me. Characters weren't very interesting or likeable, and I found myself pretty checked out on the seemingly generic fantasy story from pretty much episode 1. But at least it's finally off my list now after years of being stuck there. Also was good to confirm that the Tenchi Muyou series certainly isn't for me either, so I can strike all of that as well.

 

4 minutes ago, Bartimaeus said:

I wanted to like it more, especially as it's one of the very few titles I listed there that is both longer and presented in a nice high definition transfer (contrast that to the "Darkness of the Moon, Shadow of the Sea" OVA that I mentioned liking in the previous post, which was only available in a pretty bad VHS rip), but I just didn't really find it clicking for me. Characters weren't interesting or likeable to me, and I found myself pretty checked out on the seemingly generic fantasy story from pretty much episode 1.

Oh no, Bartimaeus got sucked into the Black Lodge and now there is a doppelganger.

[Bartimaeus]

12 minutes ago, PK htiw klaw eriF said:

Oh no, Bartimaeus got sucked into the Black Lodge and now there is a doppelganger.

The forum has been seriously wigging out for me like the last fifteen minutes - don't know how an earlier version of that post got re-posted like ten minutes after the first. I reported it for deletion.

12 minutes ago, Sarex said:

For some reason I though there was a movie for it. I must have mixed it up with the OVA. At this point I don't remember which one I liked more. Maybe I dare to rewatch it.

There's a 1995 movie, but it's not made by Madhouse and I don't think it has too much resemblance or relevance to the 1990 OVA, at least from what I can tell at a glance. And to my surprise, I apparently already tried the 3-episode 1996 OVA...which I rated even lower at 4.5/10. Whoops.

19 minutes ago, Sarex said:

Kind of in the same basket as Vampire Hunter D

I rather liked Vampire Hunter D - the original, that is. Bloodlust was...more hit and miss for me. Should probably re-watch the original to solidify my feelings about it at some point, though.

Edited November 18 by Bartimaeus

[Amentep]

Watched LITTLE NEMO: ADVENTURES IN SLUMBERLAND.  Don't think I've seen it since it first came out.  Its a fun collection of vignettes that loosely follow a story about how Nemo has to learn responsibility after allowing the Nightmare King to take over Slumberland due to following his own worst impulses.  Animation varies, but is generally high quality - you can tell that producer Yutaka Fujoka was really trying to create a Japanese animated film with animation as fluid as Disney.  May not hold up as a great narrative, but I can see why it has developed a cult following.

Its also a fascinating behind the scenes story, though.  Its failure led to the retirement of Fujioka who'd founded Tokyo Movie Shinsha and invested in the startup of Madhouse. A veritable whose who worked on it (including Hayao Miyazaki, Isao takahata, Frank Thomas, Ollie Johnson, Yoshifumi Kondō, Yasuo Ōtsuka, Brad Bird, Kazuhide Tomonaga, John Lasseter, Jerry Rees, Osamu Dezaki, Moebius, Ray Bradbury, Chris Columbus, John Canemaker,  Richard Outten, Gary Kurtz, William Hurtz, Masami Hata, Ken Anderson, Leo Salkin, Brian Froud, the Sherman Brothers); several ideas Miyazaki pitched were used in later Ghibli films and the relationships made during its long production (going back to 1975 when Fujioka began seeking the rights from Winsor McKay's family) led to Japanese animation companies partnering with US companies to make animation for the US market that by the late 80s and 90s had become a regular site on US TV.  And you get great anecdotes like Thomas or Johnson (two of Disney's famed 'nine old men' looking at drawings from Miyazaki and saying "what are they expecting us to teach you?"

As a side note, as a comic strip buff, I remember seeing Capcom's Little Nemo: The Dream Master platformer in 1990 (which I bought because how many Capcom platformers based on turn of the century comic strips were we going to get) and wondering how that happened (since the movie wouldn't come out in the US for 2 more years).

[Bartimaeus]

Yeah, I thought Little Nemo was pretty good...a little weaker with narrative and characters than you'd probably prefer for such a big and well-animated title, but it's basically an attempt to be a Disney movie, and if someone watched it as a child, I could definitely see it being a very lovely (albeit maybe confusing) trip down nostalgia lane. Didn't know all the surrounding story about it though - thanks for that. I do remember Miyazaki famously saying it was the worst experience he ever had making a film, but in all fairness, it sounded a bit like developmental hell along with there being way too many cooks in the kitchen while trying to collaborate across the ocean and through a language barrier - none of which would be trivial now, much less then. I thought I'd actually written about watching Little Nemo last summer, but it appears I did not. Whoops, wouldn't be the first time.

Edited November 18 by Bartimaeus

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

2 hours ago, Bartimaeus said:

The forum has been seriously wigging out for me like the last fifteen minutes - don't know how an earlier version of that post got re-posted like ten minutes after the first. I reported it for deletion.

[Amentep]

2 hours ago, Bartimaeus said:

Yeah, I thought Little Nemo was pretty good...a little weaker with narrative and characters than you'd probably prefer for such a big and well-animated title, but it's basically an attempt to be a Disney movie, and if someone watched it as a child, I could definitely see it being a very lovely (albeit maybe confusing) trip down nostalgia lane. Didn't know all the surrounding story about it though - thanks for that. I do remember Miyazaki famously saying it was the worst experience he ever had making a film, but in all fairness, it sounded a bit like developmental hell along with there being way too many cooks in the kitchen while trying to collaborate across the ocean and through a language barrier - none of which would be trivial now, much less then. I thought I'd actually written about watching Little Nemo last summer, but it appears I did not. Whoops, wouldn't be the first time.

Yeah its a fun kids film - the narrative weakness probably won't be an issue when seen as a kid (I have vague memories of showing this to my niece and her enjoying it).

Production was a big mess and the way they divided narrative to the US producers and director and animation to the Japanese director and animators was probably always going to set it up to struggle narratively.  The descriptions of the original Bradbury script seem wrongheaded (admittedly I haven't read all the Nemo strips, but it doesn't sound like a Nemo idea - essentially the antagonist would be Nemo's opposite, Omen) and because the US production had say on the story, Miyazaki's story ideas (some of which were good, some a bit of a headscratcher) were pretty much DOA, which frustrated him immensely.  Gary Kurtz agreed to produce it, but production dragged out so long he got tied up with other projects which slowed things down until he left.  Eventually they used ideas from Chris Columbus' script for the story even though Bradbury get a story credit.

[Gorth]

Split off from previous thread....

 

 

 

Incidentally ran across this interesting take on Dandadan episode 7. About how to do flashbacks in an interesting way and the power of show, don't tell. As well as comparisons to manga panels for the same sequences

 

 

[majestic]

On 11/18/2024 at 3:24 PM, Bartimaeus said:

It's one of the things that I think Sailor Moon in particular usually got right outside of when the show was being more dramatic: when our characters are having just casual conversation between each other, the editing of conversation is appropriately quick and natural, like a live action conversation would be. It's one of the show's better qualities over even something like Cardcaptor Sakura, where dialogue is, a lot of the time, quite a bit slower than it probably should be.

It's funny how many things in Sailor Moon are good because the show only had a shoestring budget and was following a monthly manga. The episodes were pretty streamlined and felt tight because their actual runtime was not that long. Every episode has like 10% stock footage, not counting the opening, so there was much less runtime padding needed in dialogues. The understated and dream-like backdrops were fantastic and the fact that they couldn't follow the harebrained storyline lead to something that came together so nicely. Well, when the show was not revolving around pedophile unicorns with wings.

Also, isn't it funny how a pedophile unicorn with wings is the worst thing the anime did, while for the manga that was just Tuesday?

CCS on the other hand even had a new outfit for Sakura for each episode. I recall reading an interview where CLAMP stated that they wanted her to have more outfits instead of wearing the same costume for every episode, like in older magical girl animes. That extra production time had to come from somewhere.

's complaining on a very high level though. If all anime would be nearly as well written as CCS was I would be doing a lot less complaining.

[Bartimaeus]

I obviously adore Cardcaptor Sakura, that hasn't changed with re-watching it...but I did try to take a little more of a critical eye this time around, and it was interesting to compare against my viewing of Sailor Moon, which was, after all, my very first anime show. For both of them being magical girl shows with nominally many of the same qualities, they have very different strengths...and very different weaknesses. It'll be interesting to re-visit Sailor Moon once the outstanding issues I have with the current offerings resolve themselves, which could unfortunately still be years away at this point. I think Cardcaptor Sakura will always be the more complete experience (probably further aided by the fact that it's a tigther 70 episodes and 2 movies instead of 250 episodes and 3 movies), but that doesn't necessarily mean you'll enjoy it more.

And on the subject of Madhouse animated shows, I truly hope that Madhouse's Azuki-chan will someday get English subtitles for the complete series. That's one that will seriously continue to perturb me until it happens, as I'm 99.9 percent confident that I will at least really like it, and there is very precious little of anything across any medium of entertainment that I feel 99.9% confident about really liking.

Edited November 19 by Bartimaeus

[Gorth]

Dandadan episode 8...

After the emotionally devastating episode 7 (not joking), it's back to make you smile and occasionally laugh again.

After saving Aira's life by transferring "Silky's" (we never get her real name) life force to her, they all seem have ended up at Seiko's (Momo's grandmother) house for some dinner. Udon noodles unless I'm mistaken

Starts out with an argument between Momo and Aira. The former apologizes for smashing a basin over Airas head and the latter is still convinced Momo is a demon in disguise. Hilarious argument that also has Japanses subs, because the bickering with their mouths fuill of noodles is incomprehensible, presumably even to Japanese ears.

edit: No screenshots, but honourable mention to a scene that mixes Jurassic Park (the water ripple scene and hiding in the kitchen from raptor scene) with what I assume is Godzilla completely with laser beam cutting the walls in half, trying to obliterate Momo...

 

Aira leaves the house and it's time for Turbo Granny (still trapped in the Neko Doll) to return the first of Okaruns balls. She shows herself as an excellent pitcher and returns it with a strike (I'm sure Okarun felt that one)!

 

Turns out that Aira is developing some kind of feelings for Okarun, ambushes him behind a building at school...

 

But Okarun, besides being shocked by the suddenness (wow, 3 double consonants, not something i see often),  adamantly rejects Airas advances

 

Asking her, where the heck that came from, she confesses top have learnt it from a book about romances she read!

 

When pushed on where she found such "novels"...

 

This is by the way (of course), the moment Momo walks by and sees what they're currently up to behind that building...

 

Momo feels her day is ruined...

 

Suddenly the school goes dark and the Momo is trapped by herself, while Okarun and Aira are trapped together. Turns out our old friends the Serpoans are back for more "bananas"

 

Okarun is not amused, he was so happy he just got the first of his two missing balls back

 

Turns out Aira got more than just Silky's life force in the previous transfusion, she inherited her spiritual powers too. Now she's truly the chosen one (because she's so pretty)!

 

Back story, why Okaruns balls are missing

 

[majestic]

Aria the Animaton episode 5.

I started watching this series last year in March. It speaks volumes to how much happens in these episodes that I have basically forgotten about it and only realized I haven't finished it after going through my notes.

Aria and the gang visit a secluded beach after a mysterious invitation. Turns out they came from their teachers, and they're in for training designed to make them puke blood and then some. There are a couple of obligatory crotch shots that simply have to be in an anime beach episode (probably government mandated), and then the training montage turns into spending the rest of the day at the beach and swimming in the sea and having fun, because this is still Aria the Animation.

I still have no idea what to make of this. Even a year and a half later, it was not really a problem getting back into the series, because it's basically just a handful of characters and no plot to speak of, which isn't a bad thing. If I was a good deal younger and this would air on a weekly basis like it was intended to, I'd probably tune in every week and end up having fond memories of watching the series. While being enjoyable, it is one of these series that seem to lose charm when watched in a non-linear fashion.

[uuuhhii]

On 11/22/2024 at 11:27 AM, Gorth said:

Dandadan episode 8...

After the emotionally devastating episode 7 (not joking), it's back to make you smile and occasionally laugh again.

After saving Aira's life by transferring "Silky's" (we never get her real name) life force to her, they all seem have ended up at Seiko's (Momo's grandmother) house for some dinner. Udon noodles unless I'm mistaken

Starts out with an argument between Momo and Aira. The former apologizes for smashing a basin over Airas head and the latter is still convinced Momo is a demon in disguise. Hilarious argument that also has Japanses subs, because the bickering with their mouths fuill of noodles is incomprehensible, presumably even to Japanese ears.

edit: No screenshots, but honourable mention to a scene that mixes Jurassic Park (the water ripple scene and hiding in the kitchen from raptor scene) with what I assume is Godzilla completely with laser beam cutting the walls in half, trying to obliterate Momo...

 

Aira leaves the house and it's time for Turbo Granny (still trapped in the Neko Doll) to return the first of Okaruns balls. She shows herself as an excellent pitcher and returns it with a strike (I'm sure Okarun felt that one)!

 

Turns out that Aira is developing some kind of feelings for Okarun, ambushes him behind a building at school...

 

But Okarun, besides being shocked by the suddenness (wow, 3 double consonants, not something i see often),  adamantly rejects Airas advances

 

Asking her, where the heck that came from, she confesses top have learnt it from a book about romances she read!

 

When pushed on where she found such "novels"...

 

This is by the way (of course), the moment Momo walks by and sees what they're currently up to behind that building...

 

Momo feels her day is ruined...

 

Suddenly the school goes dark and the Momo is trapped by herself, while Okarun and Aira are trapped together. Turns out our old friends the Serpoans are back for more "bananas"

 

Okarun is not amused, he was so happy he just got the first of his two missing balls back

 

Turns out Aira got more than just Silky's life force in the previous transfusion, she inherited her spiritual powers too. Now she's truly the chosen one (because she's so pretty)!

 

Back story, why Okaruns balls are missing

 

 

 

just watch monogatari as listening comprehension exercise 

anyway the quest for golden ball just recently ended in manga

so it would be about 4 season of anime

[Bartimaeus]

18 hours ago, majestic said:

Aria the Animaton episode 5.

I started watching this series last year in March. It speaks volumes to how much happens in these episodes that I have basically forgotten about it and only realized I haven't finished it after going through my notes.

Aria and the gang visit a secluded beach after a mysterious invitation. Turns out they came from their teachers, and they're in for training designed to make them puke blood and then some. There are a couple of obligatory crotch shots that simply have to be in an anime beach episode (probably government mandated), and then the training montage turns into spending the rest of the day at the beach and swimming in the sea and having fun, because this is still Aria the Animation.

I still have no idea what to make of this. Even a year and a half later, it was not really a problem getting back into the series, because it's basically just a handful of characters and no plot to speak of, which isn't a bad thing. If I was a good deal younger and this would air on a weekly basis like it was intended to, I'd probably tune in every week and end up having fond memories of watching the series. While being enjoyable, it is one of these series that seem to lose charm when watched in a non-linear fashion.

Experiencing something in a different time and place has always been one of my little musings of life: how would you feel about something (or even someone) if you experienced it right when and where you were supposed to? What might be some of your favorite things if they were given the perfect opportunity to impress themselves upon you? Alas.

Edited Monday at 09:42 AM by Bartimaeus