I occasionally mention to people that I think the original 1970s Reideen anime has one of the best final battles ever. In the past, I have not been able to support this with visual evidence, but thanks to the power of Youtube and some guy, I can now present to you the decisive battle between Akira in Reideen against the evil Baraoh. Seriously, go watch it and see how action-packed and smartly choreographed it all is.
As an aside, Akira’s mom is really hot.
It’s out, and it looks awesome. It makes me want to see the movie even more now, even if they are reusing footage from the TV series to save time and money. The TV series was already very well animated so there won’t be much of a disparity, and I get the feeling that unless you’ve watched the show over and over it’ll be difficult to spot all the moments they use existing footage.
But let’s talk about what’s really important: The reversed colors on Eureka’s outfit sometimes. Man, they look so great! I mean, I think in the end I prefer the way it is normally, with the blue on the side and the white in the middle, but the other way around is really visually striking. Maybe they’ll even make a PVC figure with those colors.
I really hope they release this movie on DVD here eventually.
Japanese meme superstar Churuya-san’s gotten her own official anime, and Haruhi-chan is a super deformed series designed to poke at the Suzumiya Haruhi franchise despite the fact that Haruhi is already about poking fun of itself.
The best part of course is that both Nyoron Churuya-san and Suzumiya Haruhi-chan no Yuuutsu are on Youtube, translated, on Kadokawa’s own page. So this is legit, guys. Totally on the up-and-up. And while neither are really the pinnacle of anime, it’s good to know that they’re looking out for us. You know, after trolling Haruhi fans everywhere and driving them into a mad rage swearing off the Haruhi franchise forever.
If you’ve seen the Churuya comics, there’s nothing really new for you except you get to hear the actual voice actors play their 4-koma counterparts. Asahina Mikuru here has shades of her Gotouza voice, and it is excellent if very brief.
Update: It seems that after a period of time the episodes go down so I’ve unlinked the videos and added a link to the Youtube channel itself.
Last week the first trailer for April 2009’s Super Robot Wars K was released. The unique thing about SRWK is that the vast majority of the series included are incredibly new by Super Robot Wars standards. Mazinger Z is the only product of the 70s, Dangaioh the only series from the 90s, and the rest are from 2000 and beyond. These are the young, slick upstarts on the block and they’re fixin’ for some trouble.
So, the trailer.
The game is on the Nintendo DS, and so is a step down graphics-wise from the especially well-animated Super Robot Wars Z, but you really shouldn’t hold that against it. The animation is slick and colorful and there’s a lot of awesome fanboy moments like Godannar’s Heart Breaker (the attack shown in the trailer) and the appearance of the Z-Gradt from Virtual On (what Temjin is fighting, also in the trailer). You’ve also got Cagalli representing SEED in the trailer AS SHE SHOULD. However, I do have some criticisms.
First is that the cut-ins where the characters appear or it cuts to non-super-deformed footage of the robots appears to be lifted straight from the shows. While it looks all well and good on its own, it creates a jarring inconsistency when paired with the sprites and their animation. This was an issue in SRWW as well.
Second is the lack of voices. I don’t know much about the hardware of the DS, but I’ve played Phoenix Wright and that game has voices, and that was even originally a GBA game. Being unable to hear Yukana as Tessa in Full Metal Panic’s SRW appearance in W was a disappointment, and this just kind of extends that.
Third is that even now on the DS, they’re still using the GBA-era sound effects that started with SRWA (which recently got a PSP remake). It’s like they spent all their time on updating the animations and none of it on the sound library.
Overall though I’m looking forward to this and probably will buy it because hey DS’s are region free. I know some people are complaining that the series lacks UC Gundam but really now, the SRW franchise is nearly 20 years old by this point. If you want UC in your SRW go play the other 95% of SRW games, which also INCLUDES SRWZ.
It is awfully strange though that with all of these NEW series, they didn’t bother to put in Mazinkaiser. Maybe it’s too played out by this point.
I’m here to remind everyone that January 31st, 2009 is the last day you can see the three exclusive Shounen Jump anime specials airing on their official website.
I already wrote a review for their Dragon Ball special, so check it out.
The One Piece special is an isolated episode, but it’s the fun and wonder you’ve grown to expect out of One Piece. Even if you’ve never actually seen One Piece before it’ll be all right as long as you’re not afraid of spoilers, as the Straw Hat Pirate crew is pretty far along by this point.
This is Letter Bee’s first anime, and it’s really nice to look at. Kind of atypical for a shounen jump series, Letter Bee feels a little more subdued than expected, which I can only call a good thing.
I’d write longer reviews but I realized that by the time I wrote them, it’d be already too late.
So go forth, young anime fan!
It’s not Pretty Cure All Stars, it’s Pretty Cure All Stars DX: We’re All Friends – The Miraculous All-Member Grand Gathering with the DX pronounce “Deluxe,” which shouldn’t come as a surprise for anyone who played Game Boy Color re-releases of classic NES games or watches videos of Japanese Smash Bros Melee.
The trailer uses the same theme song as the crossover game, and the movie is set to release March 20, 2009.
With a (sort of) movie budget and Precure’s trademark well-choreographed fight scenes combined with the sheer appeal of the Crossover, I am looking forward to this.
And maaaaaybe like one or two people were concerned about this, but according to the trailer Saki and Mai still have the ability to turn into Cure Bright and Cure Windy. Not that anyone watched Splash Star.
In a previous post I talked about how someone has had the courtesy of translating episodes of Yu-Gi-Oh!: The Abridged Series into Japanese and uploading them to Nico Nico Douga for the Japanese to enjoy. It turns out someone else has been doing the same with James Rolfe‘s most well-known internet phenomenon, the Angry Video Game Nerd (formerly known as the Angry Nintendo Nerd).
And just like with Yugioh Abridged, the fun comes from seeing how the Nico Nico Douga viewers respond to it (they love it), as well as seeing how his very American style of talking translates to a language which just doesn’t have the slang and syntax that English does. So how do you translate James’ expletive-ridden mouth into a language which simply doesn’t have the same take and history in regards to verbal obscenities? The answer is that you don’t.
Whoever the translator is, he’s opted for the spirit and not the letter. “Fuck” gets frequently translated to “kuso.” When there’s a long string of curses, the goal of the translation usually seems to be to convey his anger and not necessarily his exact language and often doesn’t even try to match the number of swears. And in some cases, certain puns or instances of wordplay don’t get translated at all to keep the subtitles simple and easy to read.
So sit back and take it up the ass in a foreign language, courtesy of Nico Nico Douga and Cinemassacre.
Actually, they’re divided into half-episode chunks, but this is certainly an improvement over when they decided to only release half-episodes on Youtube.
You can view them here.
Mind you, I’m not actually recommending the show; I’m just saying it’s available on a legitimate site that doesn’t have the unpleasant taste of Crunchyroll. I know that’s at least why I avoided watching the show past episode 1, despite easy access to rips and fansubs and what-have-you. Still, if you want to check it out, and then stop watching it once you realize the main character is aggravating in a way that only the hero of Toaru Majutsu no Index can match out of this season’s shows, here’s your opportunity.
Seriously, the main character is like if you took a 4chan poster, made him into Superboy Prime, and then gave him a giant robot.
In my quest to finds clips online that aren’t anime to help with my listening comprehension, I found out that Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso aka Rozen Aso has his own Nico Nico Douga channel. What better way to practice than with the man, the legend?
So I say, but actually the most I got out of this was learning a new phrase: マスゴミ (masugomi)
マスコミ (Mass Communication, masukomi) + ゴミ (Garbage, gomi) = マスゴミ (Mass Garbage) or something along the lines of useless politics, etc. talk.
It’s a useful phrase.
I made mention previously that Pretty Cure is getting its own special crossover movie, combining the Precure girls from every series so far. What I didn’t know is that there was already a Nintendo DS game establishing the concept. Better still, it actually got its own custom opening.
I’m glad to see the concept of the Epic Crossover extending beyond the realm of Manly Men Anime, and Manly Men Anime FIghting Manly Men Video Games, and into the territory of magical girls with the ability to roundhouse kick you down the Grand Canyon.
You smell that? That’s progress. Though there is some precedent for it.
Also I keep rewinding the video just to see Cure Bloom make that Bruce Lee face.
0:57 in.
Additional Note: The song is actually sung by all four women who’ve performed Precure OP/EDs. Damn that’s some good fan-appeal.
OGIUE MANIAX 