Winter 2010 Mid-Season Check – Idiots, Tests and Bursting Nutbladders

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As the season has reached its midpoint, I suppose it’s time to have a look at how the shows have been doing so far. This season has provided us with a few positive surprises and at least in comparison to what it was last year I can’t say it has been all that bad. Anyway, on with the current power levels…

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Let’s open today’s game with Baka to Test to Shoukanjuu. Long story short, this show has been a pleasant surprise after another. It’s incredibly funny and creative, providing several rib-breaking laughs in every episode, and all wrapped in solid audiovisual execution. I had pretty much given up on all hope to see a successful comedy anime that doesn’t rely entirely on perverted jokes or otaku reference parodies. But Baka to Test has restored my faith in the genre. The show sounds stupid and clichéd on paper but starting from the very first episode it is clear that it easily dominates any other recent series in the comedy genre.

Next up is SHAFT’s Dance in the Vampire Bund. I must take back some of my nasty words on the show from earlier as it seems that it has finally decided to quit playing B-Movie Monster Hunter and is proceeding to the more interesting bits. The last few episodes have been a delicious ride as Mina has turned out to be quite something else than just a nice loli princess and Akira is forced to reconsider his trust in her. Is she any better than the crooked Japanese politicians, attempting to established a coexistence between humans and vampires by using every dirty trick in the book? Kidnapping the prime minister’s son to force him into her will is one thing but turning the said kid into a vampire was uncalled for no matter how you look at it. Not to mention manipulating Akira by pretending to be helpless and eliminating resistance at school by brute force. Although she seems to harbor some true affinity towards Akira, I cannot help but to side with the human opposition – she is a calculative person with a very small heart and I can’t see how a coexistence can be based on fear and distrust. I wouldn’t trust a person like her with ten pennies. Although the fights in Vampire Bund are rather poorly done and I expected a lot better visual execution from SHAFT overall, I must admit that I am fascinated by the socio-political issues the show is exploring.

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Vampires didn’t make it to the god tier this time but headless Irish fairies sure did! Because Durarara!! is simply the most awesome series in this season. I guess I should say “as expected of the producers of Baccano!“, but as I haven’t seen the said show I will refrain from such commentary. Don’t worry though, I’ll have Baccano! DVD box set in my hands as soon as Amazon bothers mailing it out. But in any case, Durarara!! is a excellent series with an original, mature touch. I focuses on various circumstances surrounding the colorful folk of Ikebukuro, Tokyo. The story seems to revolve more or less around a mysterious gang called Dollars, which appears to be a loose society of goons without central leadership – much like if Anonymous was a real-life street gang. That said, the episodes are moving towards this plot element at a relaxed pace, introducing Ikebukuro and the characters in detail without too much rush. Thus it is yet too early to try guessing what exactly the focus of the show will be. I find it hard to put my finger on what really makes Durarara!! as good as it is. Everything in the show just seems to lock in place in a way that makes the weekly 25 minutes pass like it was barely five, leaving one both satisfied and with a thirst for more. The impressive seiyuu cast does a great job (Hanazawa Kana makes Anri just irresistible) and while the character animation could be more consistent, all in all the graphical look of the show is great. Just check it out.

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Hidamari Sketch X*** follows all the traditions of the franchise. No surprises here: If you liked previous Hidamari seasons, you will like X***. If you didn’t, forget about this one. X*** seems to have a bit more of actual animation but that’s about all there is to it. Surely there are two new girls in the mix but it doesn’t really change the formula all that much.

After I decided to drop Omamori Himari for being too awful even for me, Ladies versus Butlers! has the questionable honor to fill the SHIT TIER. It’s a pile of mediocre animation, shitty writing and mostly no-brainer perv jokes. Not like the basic premise of the show is all that bad but the sub-par execution makes short work of any hopes for an actually good ecchi comedy. It has bare tits of course but it’s not like you can’t find proper stuff for that if you need it. Kawasumi Ayako and Nakahara Mai make an admirable effort but there isn’t much that they can salvage. Kanokon without furries.

As for Ookami Kakushi…I must reluctantly state that I am impressed by how long it has managed to remain decent. In fact, of its kind it has soundly beaten Chaos;HEAd and 11eyes in trying to hold together as long as possible. That said, there’s no telling when the whole thing will tear itself apart. It could happen at any plot turn and there’s no way to know before it happens. Thus I’m being very careful with Ookami. So far the execution of the whole mystery plot has been surprisingly good and AIC was able to hold itself from revealing too much too early or being too stingy to leave the viewer flying blind. At this point Chaos;HEAd had already declined into a mess of incomprehensible techno-fantasy-metaphysics-babble with horrible animation but Ookami has maintained its composition and the animation is just as good as it was when the show started. Consistency is something I always appreciate. You’ve made it this far AIC, don’t fail now.

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I’m tired of ranting about Railgun really. It’s not as good as it could’ve been but then again it’s not too bad either. It’s a show that’s happy with being mediocre even though it could easily kick major ass. Right now it’s a cute-girls-doing-cute-things-type of show with a slight science fiction twist and owes much of its enjoyability to likable characters and excellent audiovisual execution. It’s like a brand new Porsche used only for taking the granny to the local grocery store on fridays so she makes it to the end-of-the-week discounts on ground beef and potatoes. It’s cool, sure, but also a gigantic waste. So as it is now, Railgun is a nice looking show with a painfully apparent lack of substance and little intention to ever do anything about it. The characters are mostly rather underdeveloped as well; the only ones with some reasonable development are poor ol’ Saten and Mii. Decent enough for sticking around on one-episode-a-week-basis but that’s pretty much it. Marathoning this would bore me to tears.

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Lastly we have A1′s So-Ra-No-Wo-To, which I rank right after Durarara!! and Baka to Test in terms of enjoyability. You may say that I’m just being a hypocrite here since SoraWoto is obviously suffering of the same underperforming as Railgun. But that’s not really true. While Railgun attempts to dance on the sharp edge between action and slice-of-life, SoraWoto makes it clear from the beginning that it’s relaxation first and everything else second. It knows what it is and what it wants while Railgun does not and in my opinion that makes a world of difference. Thanks to a unique setting, great characters and excellent sceneries, A1 has managed to infuse quite a bit of relaxed and blue atmosphere into the show. Although we mostly just see banal antics of a bunch of young female military servicemen, the show has its own charm that makes me more than willing to overlook the lack of apparent depth. The world of SoraWoto is full of life and funky happenings but behind the scenes looms a quieting post-apocalyptic world, which gives the show a unique hint of melancholy – something that kind of reminds me of Haibane Renmei. I still have no idea which direction the plot is going to take and I hope A1 will start making their move soon. Or this might be just a military version of ARIA. Not that it sounds like such a bad idea.

Did you know that 1 out of 3 people think SoraWoto is comparable with K-ON?

Now you know!

Whew, all done for now! I’ve been keeping busy with some school projects this week and I finally bothered starting up with my final thesis. I will be leaving for the United States next thursday and staying there for the following two weeks. Though I’ll prolly spend most of my time down in Florida writing my final thesis, I hope it’ll give me a bit of a breather before the hectic end of my academic education. The obligatory SAD post coming up next, stay tuned.