Review Mary and witch's flower

Note: unlike with most reviews I and reviewing this movie from watching it in my local theater. So I don't have normal screencaps of this movie,

Mary Smith is a girl who has just moved to the countryside and is bored out of her mind. The only other child in the village is a boy named Peter and the two are at loggerheads. She looks around the countryside she find a strange luminous flower. She find that this flower contains magical power including allowing her to fly on a broom that she finds. She flies to the magic school, Endor college but are the people that run the place as forthright as they first appear?

Mary and the witch's flower is a movie based on a book. It is also the first major outing by studio Ponoc, a studio which is formed from the ashes of the famous studio Ghibli. This movie is a family movie and thus there is nothing objectionable in this movie.

I found this movie to be a solid movie and there is little to complain about in this movie. I found the main character to be a solid protagonist and the rest of the cast to be decent as well. Even though this is a movie for kids I found the plot to be not insulting to my intelligence. Also the animation to this show to be wonderful.

Overall I found this to be a solid fantasy show

Rating the silver broomstick (Kiki's delivery service) for a very nice film staring a girl riding a broom

Review Alice and Zoroku

It is the Christmas review so I just had to

Sana appears to be just another young girl wandering around in the rain being chased by some government agents. But the truth is she is a runaway psychic ( whose powers are called the dreams of Alice) being with immense power. Well on the run she happens to run into an elderly florist by the name of Zoroku. The man decides to take sauna in and they begin living together.

Cute girls plotting destruction

Alice and zouroku is an anime adapted from a manga of the same name. Even though the manga is still ongoing the anime does manage to have a satisfactory ending to it. It is an interesting mix of action mystery and some slice-of-life elements causing it to be a bit hard to the classified men genre except for some violent scenes in episodes 4 & 5 there's little to be offended by in the show.

It's actually not as bad as you think

I found Alice to Zoroku to be an interesting mix of genres, being that the show has to much action in it to be a slice of life by any stretch of the imagination. However it's more laid back segments allow it to ground the characters and make the relationships more solid. However I found the show most interesting for having a child protagonist in a show with that much action while staying true to her character. 

Overall I found Alice to Zoroku to be an interesting and somewhat overlooked take on magical girl genre without much of the trope baggage.

Rating the Silver Diclonious (Elfin Lied)

Review Anthem of the Heart

Note there are no pictures with this review because I watched it at Sakura Con

When she was little Jun Nanase witnessed her father commit adultery and as a result was cursed by an egg to be unable to speak. Years later Jun is selected by her teacher to be on a committee to to put together a performance for the community. It is decided that the performance will be a musical but what will that mean for Jun's curse as well as the other three students on the committee?

Anthem of the Heart is a movie that is mostly a teenage romantic drama. It also has a small amount of comedy to it, not enough to interrupt the drama but it helps the movie from feeling too heavy or pretentious. Although it is a romantic show the movie isn't one that is geared to one gender and is clean enough that you can watch with most of the family although little children probably wouldn't like this.

The main cast consists of the four students in the committee and each of them has enough sub plots to them to make the movie complex but not convoluted.All the main characters feel fleshed out as they could be in a normal length movie and they work well and build on each other as well. In truth there is little I can say about this movie that isn't praise.

Overall I think Anthem of the Heart is a movie that I think could earn it's place among the anime movie classics.

Rating the Golden Egg for being a wonder of a movie that restored my faith in anime. 

Review Kaiba

There will always be giant robots

In the distant future it is possible to download someone's memories into a chip and then either alter then or transfer them to another body. In this future a man with no memories awakes. The two things notable about him are a giant hole where his heart should be and a locket with the blurred picture of a girl that he can not remember.

Sometimes you just can't explain the scene

For a long time I thought that Kaiba was one of those artsy shows that only snobs like. After actually watching it I found that this show is actually interesting. The most obvious thing about the show is the art style which hard to describe but is rather unique to say the least. However if you consider yourself a fan of animation as a art this is a show you simply have to watch.

Strangely animated ice cream at that

However as a conventional show I found the plot to rather impenetrable. A lot of this has to do with the fact that at least for the first few episodes the protagonist has all the charisma and motivation of a lobotomized slug. However by the midpoint of the show the plot actually starts to pick up and the characters start to develop in earnest.

Overall I found Kaiba to an interesting science fiction show although if I know if you think this show to be too artsy for your I will totally understand.

Rating The silver broom (Maho Shougo Tai) for being a rather interesting show that's strongest point is it's constant phantasmagoria.

Review Nichijou

Dog is there for you

This is the story of the everyday life of three high school girls, Mio, Yuko and Mai. This is also the story of the everyday life of Nano the robot with a clock screw on her back, the child professor she takes care of and Sakamoto the talking cat. There are also some other characters that show up from time to time and it's their daily life as well, no matter how strange it is.

Obligatory shoe joke

To put it simply  Nichijou is a collection of show comedy skits (most of three minutes in length although a few are longer) stacked end to end until it is the length of a regular television show. Although the show is suposedly about daily life the can easily do something absurd (like deer wrestling) or break the laws of physics just because the show feels like it for a sketch.

Like I said not only school girls in this show

Quality in comedy is something that is almost impossible to judge but I found that in the case of Nichijou the comedy changes gears enough that even if the comedy is a bit hit or miss at times there should be some nice solid hits most of the time for most people.

Be careful not to rust

Overall I consider Nichijou I decent time waster of a comedy anime show

Rating the bronze Mesousa (Pani poni Dash) for being a decent slice of life show where anything can happen. 

Review Lord Vanadis and Marksman

Eleonora wants you

As a nobleman in the country of Brune Tigre followed his sovereign when it waged war on the country of Zhcted. Although he fought valiantly, his side was defeated and he was captured. He did manage to impress his captor, the powerful war maiden Eleonora, to the point that he managed to convince her to help him save his homeland. This is the beginning of their adventures together.

The question just had to be asked

Vanadis and lord Marksman is a twelve episode television show based off of a series of light novels. This show is set in fantasy world meaning that the show promises several sword fights, court intrigues but unfortunately no elves.Actually it is different from traditional western fantasy in that most of the main cast is supernaturally proficient in fighting.
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This show has a heavy helping of the fan-service. However the female characters of the show (namely the Vanadis) are all strong willed and self directed so I have a hard time calling this show sexist despite the fact that they run around in pretty much their underwear. The show is also has a fairly decent plot that doesn't get bogged down and also one that manages to end at a good stopping point.

Overall I found Vanadis and Lord Marksman to be a short and fun fantasy action show

Rating the bronze Mini Maya (Tenjo Tenge) for being a fun to watch action show with a decent amount of fan service.

Review Kuroko's Basketball (Season 1)

Don't anger the manager

Teiko Middle school had a truly amazing basketball team with five legendary members known as the generation of miracles. Rumor has it that there was a phantom sixth member of the team. At the opening day two notable people join the Seirin basketball team, a tall and athletic man named Kagami and another man with no presence called Kuroko.

The ending animation are a constant source of entertainment

Kuroko's basketball is a very straightforward shonen sports show, and there is nothing wrong about that. In fact the most unusual thing about this show for it's genre is the main character and how he is reserved to the point of almost feeling emotionless instead of being the hotblooded stereotype. However he does have one of those in his partner Kagami. 

obligatory ass shot

This show has a reputation for being fujoshi bait. If you are someone who likes pairing off the characters go ahead and this is a great show for you. However if that isn't how you roll this show is still a great, action packed sports action show that knows how to hit all the beats so to speak. 

In short Kuroko's basketball is a great show that should appeal to a wide audience. I recommend it wholeheartedly

Rating the silver psibody (star driver) for being a show that you shouldn't miss regardless of any homoerotic appeal it might have.

Review Upotte

Girls that are guns

Seishou academy is a very special school in that the students there are guns in human form. One day a new language teacher (who is unamed) arrives at the school and quickly meets the Belgian made FNC assault rifle (who is called Funco) and gets shot when he embarrasses her. However this is only the beginning of the story with Funco and her friends.

No this is my yuri pairing

Upotte is a slice of life comedy show about girls who are somehow guns (this manifests as the girls being able to draw their guns from nowhere). The show incorporates a surprising amount of trivia about military firearms and manages to work it into the show is somewhat amazing, you might learn something.

Stop, hammer time

This show manages to have more of a plot than the usual slice of life show has, as girls that are somehow guns allows for some pretty good action sequences. Needless to say the show is usually better and almost always different than the first episode so don't let that episode turn you off of the show. The show isn't full of underwear jokes, I can tell you that.

overall I found Upotte to be a slice of life show with a gimmick that works just well enough to make the show entertaining.

 Rating the bronze Hetzer (Girls und Panzer) for being a decent cute girls and military show.

Dog Days (season 3) review

come you will an excellent addition to my harem It has been some time since Shinku as well as his friends Nanami and Rebecca have been summoned to the fantasy realm of Flonargd to Perform as their nation's heroes and to meet up with their friends in the realm. Everything was going according to plan when Shinku and Nanami were struck by lightning as they were being summoned and thrown way off course.  What adventure awaits them in their new and unfamiliar location? Yes girls, there will always be slime monsters in this show I have always found Dog Days to be a delightful but rather vapid sort anime show. What I believe is make this show different from many other shows in that it has it's own strange id as to speak, as it is a fan service show that follows it's own script rather than try to ape other shows. As such Dogs may feel a bit weird and slightly inane at times but it's fun and fast paced at the same time. What this show needed a shota rabbit This third season of Dog Days is about as good as the previous two seasons of the show. There isn't any substantial war games in this season but the show makes up for it with   plentiful demon hunting episodes. There are a few more characters adding to the show's already ponderous cast. Overall I found the third season of dog days to be simple stupid fun, just like the rest of the franchise. Rating the bronze chainsaw (kore wa zombie) for being a delightful mixture of action and moe service

Kofuku Graffitin

Even pyramid head goes moe

Ryou Machiko was a lonely girl ever since her grandmother died. Most importantly she couldn't cook as well she could. By chance her cousin Kirin had to stay in the city once a week do to her taking a class in the city. When she cooked for her Ryou found her true love of food for when it was cooked and eaten with another person.

The fourth wall is no match for Eel.

Kofuku Graffiti is a slice of life show about cooking. There are two big differences between this show and most slice of life shows is that in every episode the much ado about food and the fact that this show has a smaller core cast than most shows of the genre.  (although the show tries to convince you that Shina is a main character although she really doesn't have much presence in the show). I found this causes the show to be a rather weak example of the slice of life genre.

While the show does have it's premise and if handled properly it would have been more interesting the show simply repeats itself too much. On top of this I found Kirin slightly annoying with her usual selfishness, which given she is usually about half the cast kills the moe aspects in the show. 

In short Kofuku Grafiti is a weak slice of slice show that hangs it's premise mostly on a food gimmick but fails at it.

Rating the tin mermaid (ponyo) for being a work that fails to measure up despite a prominent director.

Review Hibike (sound) Euphonium

I am all over this pairing

Kumiko Oumae is a girl who has been practicing the Euphonium for years although she had no great plans for music. When she entered high school school she joined the orchestra club almost as a matter of course and meets up with some news friends as well as Reina a friend from middle school who is more serious about music. As always this is a new chance and what will happen this year?

Got your nose

Hibike Euphonium is a coming of age story based around a school orchestra. Being from the studio it does (Kyoto animation) comparisons to the show K On are inescapable (to be entirely fair I referred to Reina as Trumpet Mio for a couple of episodes). However given the show's plot and emotional weight it is wrong to call it a slice of life show.

Senpai noticing you comes with it's own dangers

This show has a fairly large cast of minor characters, this being a show about an orchestra. I found that this show uses them to introduce new angles in the overall theme of working hard to be good at music in a competitive environment. All this is done while not taking too much time away from the main cast and giving them enough time to feel fleshed out. 

Terrorist fist jab

Overall I found Hibike Euphonium to be a really good story in terms of looks, theme and characters. It's an all around solid package.

Rating the silver Minmay for being such a great musically driven show. 

Review Atelier Escha and Logy

Slice of Life with occasional Golem fight

In a land which battles an encroaching desolation called the dusk there are special people who study the long lost technologies to make life better, they are called Alchemists. In a small frontier town called colseit Escha is an alchemist who dreams of exploring the ruins floating in the sky. Her life begins to change when another alchemist named Logy is assigned to the Colseit alchemist guild.

Trust me there are story reasons why she has a tail

Atelier Escha and Logy is a show based off a video game of the same name from the Atelier series. As for a genre classification the show is pretty much a slice of life show with copious fantasy elements. I am not familiar with the game so I can't make a comparison on the faithfulness of the show.

And that task involves staying in this thingy somehow.

I found this show is nice and charming and serviceable as a slice of life show. There is a decent amount of character development although some things could use some more closure. I found the show to be charming with most of the attention in the show paid to individual characters and with a mixed cast it felt a little less cloying than your usual “four girls doing nothing” show with just the barest amount of plot substance to it but not much.

Overall I found Escha and Logy to be just a simple diversion of a show.  

Rating the bronze Hadouken (Street Fighter II ) for being a decent anime show based off of a video game.

Hidamari Sketch 365

Staring the day with a real alarm clock.

Yuno was a bit aprehensive about living away from home to go to an art focused High School. However she found that the other three girls who lived at the Hidamari apartments were really nice and Yuno became good friends with all of them. This story focuses on the everyday lives of the girls that live in the Hidamari apartments.

I am surprised the people on the left are drawn.

As you could probably guess from the introduction paragraph Hidamari Sketch 365 is obviously a slice of life show. As with many shows of the genre this show is incredibly episodic, even more so in this show, as even though 365 is the second season of Hidamari Sketch the first episode is the first that happens chronologically. Other episodes happen at random intervals during Yuno's first year at High School.

Yuno is the quiet pillar of maturity

I found the character chemistry in Hidamari Sketch works a bit better than in most slice of life shows and since the show is very character driven this is a big plus. The strength of the girl's friendship allows the show to be somewhat heartwarming as opposed to the cloying feeling that can happen when a show focuses totally on being moe. Also this show is Directed by Akiyuki Shinbo and it shows given how the show can slip into odd visual style with barely any notice.

Overall I found Hidamari Sketch 365 to be a cut above most slice of life shows and if you are wanting to give the genre a look this would be a good option.

Review Glasslip

I think I'm a clone now

Toka Fukakami is a young woman who has the hobby of blowing glass like her father. She lives in a small town with four of her closest friends. Things looks like they could change when a new boy named Kakeru comes to town. His arrival awakens a strange power to see the future in Toka when she looks through glass.

Weren't expecting that in a slice of life show.

Glasslip is a thirteen episode show which is sort of cross between slice of life and drama which seems to be a new specialty of P A works, the studio behind this show.  While this formula has worked in other shows I found that it falls completely flat in the case of Glasslip. The problem I feel is that it is a combination of two genres but lacks the usual draws of both.

Dramatic undressing

As a slice of life show it fails as there isn't any good comedy or cuteness to distract from the lack of a plot. As a drama this show fails as there isn't any really good character development and much of the show lacks a clear direction. While some high concept types might accept this as naturalist storytelling, the presence of supernatural elements in the show ruin even that angle.

Overall Simply don't watch Glasslip. I wanted to like this show but it simply doesn't work at any level.

Rating the Tin flower (Aoi Hana) for being a dreadfully boring story about teenagers

Review Clannad the movie

Our charming Heroine

Tomoya Okazaki was a young man who drifted through life after an altercation with his father resulted in an injury that made him quit basketball. One day he meets a mysterious but very cheerful girl named Nagisa. Nagisa eventually tries to draw Tomoya in an effort to reestablish the disbanded theater club. Tomoya also has a reoccurring dark dream, how will Nagisa fit into that as well as the rest of his life?

I will make this into a sports anime, darn it.

The Clannad movie is one based off of a visual novel and has another adaptation done as a television show. The most obvious difference between this movie and other versions of the story is that given that the movie is only an hour and a half long there has been a lot of material cut out of it for sake of brevity.  While there are movie adaptations that can handle this well in the case of Clannad important emotional scenes in the television show were neutered. 

Some interesting visuals in this movie though

While it is to be expected that the movie would limit it's material to Nagisa's route in Clannad it even trims things down to the point of things like Nagisa's parents and Ushio are gutted in terms of personality. The movie has a strange visual style to it and the high point of this movie is the directing. I do wonder if someone who is totally unfamiliar with the franchise would enjoy this movie more.

Overall I found that Clannad was too large of a story to place in a hour and a half movie. 

Rating the bronze curry (angel beats) for a movie that was cut too short to be made in it's full potential.

Review Ringing Bell (Chiren no Suzu)

Aren't they adorable

Chiren is a little lamb who is innocent to the world and like any lamb lived in the meadow with his mother. One important thing she told him was to be wary of the king of the wolves and not to wander far from the flock. However one night tragedy strikes Chiren and that gives him the drive to become strong like the king of the wolves.

There is a lot of attention paid to the backgrounds of this movie.

Ringing Bell is the story of an adorable little lamb and his descent into darkness via revenge and violence. This movie has the makings of a family animated film despite how unexpectedly dark the movie is for a family film. In all honesty I was planning on watching this movie on a lark but was honestly surprised by how good this movie was.

I don't think those are good horns.

This movie is a short one but I found it long enough to tell a story that was short but very compelling. In terms of plot it is rather simple but in this case I believe it's simplicity is an asset as opposed to a detriment. Although the story is dark it never felt pointlessly exploitative. The animation style is very different from what one would expect from anime and it is not only unusual it is very pretty as well.

Overall if you are interested in anime as an art form I recommend Ringing Bell as something that can expand your horizons.

Rating the silver little unicorn (Unico) for being an old anime that still holds up all of these decades.

Review Amagi Brilliant Park

Sometimes you need to get told you got punk'd

Seiya Kanie is a young man who used to be famous but now just coasts through life. One day is asked by Isuzu Sento, one of his classmates, to become the manager of a rundown amusement park. This park is special because it's employees are fairies and if the park closes down they will lose the magic they need. After some convincing Kanie takes up the task of getting half a million visitors in three months.

On your right we have an interdimensional pirate ship

Amagi Brilliant park is an anime series based off of a series of light novels. Although it has an overarching plot in getting Kanie to save the park for the most part the show is episodic with most episodes featuring on some aspect of the park. This show is also mostly comedy with some light action and drama as well as fan service (it isn't heavy enough to call it fan service show) thrown in for good measure.

Sento dealing with customers

Amagi Brilliant Park is a character based show and fortunately the show has a pretty decent cast of characters. I felt there weren't any really amazing ones but on the other hand no character is overdone. Kyoto animation does a good job with the animation and keeping the show interesting. In short it's a show with a little bit of everything which makes it a bit hard to describe but the elements of the sow balance each other out.

Overall I found Amagi Brilliant Park to be little more than a simple entertaining show but sometimes that is all you need

Rating the bronze

Review Iwatobi swim club

Little know fact, Rei's hand smells awesome

Haruka Nanase is a young man who loves water and swimming but only swims freestyle. One day Rin, an old friend of his moves back to Japan and challenges him to a swimming match and beats him easily. This motivates Haruka to start a new swim club with his old friends. But do Haruka and his friends have enough talent and skill to become great swimmers?

Sometimes those fanfics practically write themselves

Free is a sports anime show and one that is somewhat infamous for having some controversy about it. In my opinion I found it completely unnecessary as animation studios are mercenary entities that will please any demographic that could be profitable. On top of this I found Free to be a decent show regardless of any pandering to a female fan base that that this show has.

But would a good girl be snooping on other's conversations?

I found this show to be a decent enough sports show with decent enough characters and a plot to be considered a good (although not great) show simply by narrative merit. There is equal parts character drama and some light comedy to keep the show from being too dark or heavy. There is of course fujoshi based fan service but at least it isn't something used to distract from the show's failings.

Overall Free Iwatobi Swim Club is a great show for fans looking for hot guys in their anime and it should be tolerable for most everyone else.

Rating the bronze Suzaku (Fushigi Yuugi) for be a decent show regardless of being full of bishonen.

Review Kiniro Mosiac

Hair wings

One time a Japanese girl Shinobu stayed with an English family and became friends with their daughter Alice. Years later Alice decided to visit her friend in Japan and she decided to live there. The two of the them as well as their friends go about their everyday lives in this situation.

Don't feed the wild moe girls

Kiniro Mosiac is a slice of life show based off of a four koma manga. As such it doesn't try to have much of a plot and centers around being cute and funny. Doing cute is something that this show does very, very well. The humor is a bit more hit or miss but I found it mostly goes hand in hand with being cute.

With posture like that you know it's not a sports anime show

I wouldn't call this a slice of life show that really tries to be anything special but it works as a very decent vanilla show of it's genre. Like many shows of this type it has some soft yuri vibes but with everything else about Kiniro Mosaic it is very innocent and generally goes nowhere.

Take it Off!

Overall I found Kiniro Mosaic to be nothing more than weaponized cuteness and it is kind of proud of that.

Rating the bronze Hokago teacup (K On) for being a nice and decent slice or life show.