Winter, 2011

So most of the previews are out, except for the one I look forward to the most (where does Arodouc find all those gifs?) and Sea Slugs. (Update: he posted it the next day.) But it’s enough to work with, so here goes. Bear in mind, this is not a list of previews. Go see my primary sources THAT and Random Curiosity if you’re looking for PV’s or detailed information on which studio, staff, and seiyuus are doing what. This is nothing but me talking about what I plan to watch, and maybe adding in a bit of extraneous input.

So, without further ado…

Beezlebub — No. Looks too stupid. And it’s Weekly Shounen Jump. I have a heuristic; I don’t watch WSJ-derived shows, and I see nothing here that will make me change my mind. Time and again, the description of the manga has failed to draw me in; short of Bakamonogatari-level dialog, I have no interest.

Cardfight — Be serious.

Dragon Crisis — generic, no interest.

Fractale — I have yet to see a Noitamina show that could keep my interest. I’m willing to give this one a chance, but nothing I see here really makes me want to bite, except for the Scrapped-Princess-like world design. Yutaka Yamamoto, he formerly of KyoAni, and now of Ordet, has stated that epic show will be epic success or he’ll quit. Bear in mind, this is the guy that got canned from Lucky Star, directed Kannagi (which I found to be mediocre) and Black Rock Shooter (which I found to be a tedious WTF? exercise in the Power of Friendship Overcoming All). I don’t know whether to root for the show’s success so it will be worth watching (and redeem him, IMHO) or dismal failure so we’ll finally be rid of him…

Freezing — This has some possibilities, but only if the writers are willing to depart from the manga. A year ago, I wrote:

Freezing C- Once again, someone’s crossed Lord of the Flies with Candidate for Goddess. It still doesn’t work. Pandoras (all women) select underclassmen called Limiters (all male) at the Genetics military academy, and form offensive/defensive partnerships to fight alien invaders. Chosen boy Kazuya Aoi (younger brother of a deceased war hero) transfers in, where meets a look-alike of his sister, the busty meganekko tsundere Satellizer L. Bridgette (no one calls her by anything shorter). She’s the hyper-violent Untouchable Queen. Surprise, it turns out, he’s the only one who can touch her. But why does he have such incredible, yet temperamental freezing power, that he can use without a Pandora partner, and why is every other woman at the academy violently gunning for Satellizer L. Bridgette?

In June I followed up with:

Freezing: The abrupt change in focus away from Bridgette and Aoi has resulted in the introduction of too many new characters too fast; it’s gone from Lord of the Flies to Bleach, in that all the focus is now on fighting the enemy. Definitely losing interest in this. Grade: D

The major problem is its incoherency; it’s gone from Lord of the Flies to harem, back to Lord of the Flies, to seinen (except with pretty girls), and some of the transitions were pretty abrupt. It’s quite violent at times, though not a Black Lagoon by any means. I think Impz said it best: “The storyline is half decent and pretty serious for a fanservice type of manga, but the characters are very one-dimensional.” If the writers are willing to break away from the manga and fix its worst flaws, it could be decent.

Gosick — I might be, from watching this. I’ll give it an episode or two.

Haiyoru! Nyaruani –– I thought they were going to create actual episodes, not those 4-minute skits that had full-length OP/EDs. Not something to make a point of, but it might fill the time. I did sort of like the OVA’s that came out a while back.

Houkago no Pleiades — Gainax meets Fuji Heavy Industries. Seriously. No. Or rather, only if it’s got a Gainax ending, and then only so I’ll know what the fans are bitching about.

Hourou Musuko — “The series deals with issues such as transsexuality, gender identity, and the beginning of puberty.” Remember what I said about Noitamina not holding my interest? Well this ain’t gonna be the one to change that! It’s a series that speaks to the 0.5% of our population that is seriously confused. Well, it’s nice to that we’re not alone in our descent into irrelevant stupidity; the Japanese are keeping us company. I don’t think those two words (in either sentence) are quite correct there, but I’m too kind, and it’s not politically correct to say “fucked-up” and “fucking bullshit”. Oh, wait… I think there was an error somewhere in that sentence.

Infinite Stratos — I’m not that interested in mecha. I’m not that interested in mecha. I’m not that interested in WOW! THAT BATTLE ANIMATION IS GOOD! Ok, seriously, if they didn’t blow the entire budget on the first episode, I may have to watch this just for the battle sequences. It has nothing to do with the good looking girls and boobage, I assure you!

Kimi no Todoke — Not my speed.

Kore wa Zombie Desu ka? — This has the possibility to be my weird/offbeat show for the season. I’m not wild about the character designs and such, but the setup looks like Princess Resurrection, only with a stronger guy in the middle.

Level E: This doesn’t look like my cup of tea, but it’s said to have a cheeky, smart-ass feel to it. To a GM who’s been accused of making all his RPG NPC’s smart-asses, this is not a drawback at all. I’ll give it an episode or two, although the protagonist sounds like a jerk.

Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magica Shaft is the studio and Shinbou Akiyuki is the director. Shinbou is not on my list of top directors, but he’s probably deserving a spot . He has definitely assembled an all–star staff, and is working with an original script. That’s the scary part; there’s almost no information on this show. I’ll check it out, for certain.

Mitsudomoe — Still no.

Moshidora — Depends on how many CEU’s I can get for watching this. (From the “It ain’t funny if I have to explain the joke department”: The show is about a female baseball team manager who applies principles from Management, by Drucker. CEU= Continuing Education Units — sort of a post-education education measurement.)

Onii-chan no Koto Nanka whatever whatever. — These weirdly drawn girls and loser protagonist do not interest me. Look, I’ve watched a grand total of two incest shows in the last year. One was the original KissxSis OVA’s, which had the advantage of being able to push the envelope without quite becoming porn. The other was Yosuga no Sora, which was definitely softcore porn, and finally delivered the expected trainwreck at the end. Put me in the camp of those that believe the twins died, and their friends are just kidding themselves.

Rio RainbotGate! — Unlikely. Looks like it’s going to be dumb fanservice for a game franchise.

Starry Sky — Ewww! Bishie! Bishie! Get it off me, it’s icky! (Helluva cast though.)

Suite Precure — What do multiple hotel rooms have to do with magical girls? Wait, I’m not that pervy!

Supernatural — I didn’t watch it when it was an American series, so why now?

Yumekui Merry — From the director of Casshern Sins. Um… last nail in coffin, I believe.

Wolverine — Looks like it’s going to be about the same as Iron Man, in other words, just a Japanese veneer over the American comic. I’d hoped for more, as in the comics, Wolverine had some connections to Japan. Pass.

Some OVA’s of interest in the next several months:

Black Lagoon: Roberta’s Blood Trail — Yes!

Time Paladin Sakura — Do I need to have seen Da Capo to understand this?

Kodomo no Jikan — Hell NO.

Kara no Kyoukai – What?

Ah! My Goddess — Oh cool, sure.

Queen’s Blade — Um, no.

Fortune Arterial — The series was boring, inanely average dreck. I see no point in making an OVA of it.

Aso bi ni Iku Yo — Why, yes, thank you very much.

In the “Where’d It Go?” category, I thought Mirai Nikki was coming out this season. I guess it’s Spring ’11. Whenever, it is SO on my list.

Update: crap, what I thought was a nine-minute preview was the actual OVA. It’s not an episode so much as it is a bid for support to have an anime. Which I’ve been wanting for some time.

Update 2: And just this morning, the final chapter of Mirai Nikki was posted on Mangafox.

Update 3: as noted above, Aroduc has posted his reviews, and he’s uniformly down on the season. He’s looking primarily at writers and directors, and builds a good case for why some shows are highly likely to suck. I also note, I am not alone in my opinion of Noitamina shows.