Tuesday, July 16, 2013

Summer preview part 6 A tale of crowds



Here it is folks we are finally in the home stretch of my summer anime preview. With the addition of this article the tally of shows that I have watched and reviewed for the summer season is twenty. I can only hope that my articles have helped some of you that are less willing to sit through all of these shows if for no other reason that they do not have an anime blog of their own and don't have to watch a bunch of shows they weren't thinking of watching simply to put up content for said blog.

Monogatari Second Season
The story opens with Tsubasa Hanekawa waking up to what she thinks will be an ordinary day. That is until she walks by a giant white talking tiger. She brushes of the meeting as best she can until another unexpected occurance happens, her house burns down. Despite the title this is the third season of the franchise (after Bakemonogatari and Nisemonogatari) so you probably shouldn't watch this if you aren't familar with the franchise. That said I found that almost all of the old strengths of the previous seasons were still there and this first episode gives us something new to chew on with the series protagonist, Araragi, not appearing at all and the focus being cast on the relationship between Hanekawa and Senjogahara. I look forward to the rest of this new season.

Gatchaman Crowds

The Earth is in danger from beings from outer space. To combat this menace there is a secret team of superheroes called Gatchaman. One day school girl Hajime receives a strange notebook and then soon finds out that she is the latest Gatchaman. Even though this first episode was clearly a stock introduction to a main character getting super powers I found it rather good. High points include Hajime's charmingly airhead personality which smooths over a lot of the boring but neccessary exposition scenes and the art style of the show which has a lot of interesting flourishes including Tiger and Bunny-esque super hero suits.

The eccentric Family

In the city of Kyoto there is not only humans but also tengu and tanuki. This is the story of (name) a tanuki who wishes to do more in life than to simply accept his fate. As such he mingles with some tengu and shapeshifts to look like a human. I am somewhat conflicted on how to describe this show. The general lack of plot in the first episode would have me label this show as a slice of life anime show. On the other hand, I found the character interactions to feel more complex than the simple comedy or Iyashikei that such shows tend to go for. However I can say that I am rather intrigued by the show and feel as though it is defintiely worth checking out, especially if you are looking for something different in anime.

Fate kaleid liner prism Illiya

Illiya is a normal school girl and just as you would expect she gets magic powers in the first episode. In this particular show said power source is the magical ruby stick who chose her after leaving her old master, Rin Tohsaka, for squabbling too much. From the first episode I can tell that this is more of a parody of magical girl shows using mostly Fate Stay night characters. The comedy was okay although I have the feeling that many people will be turned off by the show's fan service, especially given that a lot of it of a young lady like Illiya.

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