Well, I'm back from work and I actually had a couple of days of downtime between wells which means I got to make a big dent in some of my backed up anime:
Ninin Ga Shinobuden (2x2 Shinobuden): I actually finished this one the day before I went to work. It was recommended to me by a friend who, after this, I really have to decide whether or not to listen to his recommendation anymore. The story appears to revolve around a kunoichi named Shinobu and her interactions with her friend Kaede, sister, master (a weird ball-thing named Onsukamaru) and ninja clan. Beyond the main character being a ninja in training and part of a ninja clan, the series really doesn't have too much else to do with Ninjas, thus justly deserving the translation of its name: Ninja Nonsense. In any case, it felt rather typical in the amount of fan-service being thrown about, the jokes (a fair amount of which were toilet humor from Onsukamaru) and the general interactions between the characters: I think I'd have to put this at a 1/5: watch it and forget about it. (or avoid it as the case may be: I don't feel you'll miss anything by not having it around).
Ayakashi-Japanese Classic Horror: This was a very nice 13 episode series and was engaging enough to keep me pissed off every time someone interrupted me and stopped the flow of the series. It breaks down into 3 stories: The first being a samurai story of betrayal and back-stabbing, the second is the love story between a demon princess (or forgotten-god) and a falconer and the third (my particular favorite) is the story of the haunting of a family by a Bake-Neko (Demon Cat). Art work is stellar and changes with each story and each story is engaging in its own right. The characters are well fleshed out and their situations are portrayed very nicely. A plus for me was that Yo****aka Amano (one of the illustrators for Neil Gaiman's The Sandman) was also involved in this series. 5/5.
Area 88: Fitz, as it stands, you were absolutely right in our previous discussion. For those who don't know Area 88 was an OVA from the 80's about a pilot who was tricked into flying for a militant state's Air Force. The only way out of the contract with their Air Force is either to die, earn 1.5 Million Dollars and buy out your contract or go AWOL. The series I watched is a newer version, and while you can pick up a lot of the story from this series and the series does stand on its own if you haven't seen the OVA (like me). Details in the artwork are very good and the characters are all presented very nicely. The only mild drawback for me was that the dogfights were clearly mostly done in CGI and the jump from animation to CGI was fairly noticeable. But since the CGI was only really used for dogfights, things weren't too choppy. Overall, a very nice series, but you can tell, as Fitz told me, that there is more in the back story that you are missing if you don't catch the OVA as well. 4/5.
This Ugly Yet Beautiful World: Ah, Gainax! How I love your ability to come up with series that interest me. This series was indeed, another work by Gainax, and in my opinion, it turned out very nicely. The series revolves around a boy named Takeru Takemoto and his interaction with what ends up being essentially an Angel of Death come to cause the next mass extinction. The 'Angel' is named Hikari and she is part of the Greater Design; a mechanism to cause an extinction every time a particular form of life becomes too dominant. Things aren't one sided in this matter though, but discussing it further opens up a can of spoilers and this is really too good a series to spoil, though I'll admit that seasoned anime viewers will probably see most of the twists coming from a mile away. Do yourself a favor though--give this series a shot. It is short, but it is also well worth it: 4.5/5
Beyond The Clouds-The Place Promised In Our Early Years: I caught an AMV someone made on youtube using clips from this movie and the artwork caught my attention. In fact, that's probably the only reason I found this movie and gave it a shot. It takes place in an alternate future where Japan is divided into the North (which has the support of Russia) and the South (with the support of America). The story revolves around 3 friends and a plane that they are building from scratch so they can fly across the military border to see a mysterious white tower in the Northern Territory that is so tall, it can be seen even from most parts of the Southern Territory. In my opinion, I have seen better anime movies but the plot was rather reasonable, the characters weren't too over the top, and the animation was just beautiful. I'd have to go with this being a solid 4/5.
Ranma 1/2: To be fair, I have seen several episodes of Ranma, but they are all random episodes and it was hard to follow character development as a result. I finally broke down, found all of the series and started watching it from the bottom 2 weeks ago. I've finished about 2/3 of it and I love that even though I still prefer the manga, the anime has the same knack for showing how even though Ranma and Akane have a lover's quarrel about next to anything and everything, they still develop and harbor strong feelings for each other. I really do like this series even though I can see why some people hate it with a passion. In any case I give it a 3.5/5 for now, but I don't see the last 50 episodes changing that opinion for better or worse.
Looking forward to what I have coming up to finish before I start looking at the new season:
Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann
Macross Frontier
You're Under Arrest-Full Throttle
Black Cat
Kurogane Communication
