Based on the visual novel game, titled Phantom ~Phantom of Inferno~, and produced by BEETRAIN, this anime looks full of gun fights and great music to accompany it.
The episode starts with a couple of assassins infiltrating what seems to be the house of a crime lord. After interrupted by the great opening song, the scene changes to a flashback, where the male assassin is being imprisoned in an abandoned building. When he tries to escape, a girl with a mask tries to stop him, or test him, rather. Their fight is being monitored by a group of people who seems interested in what he is capable of.
At the end of the fight, while the male emerge victorious, he forgoes the chance to kill the girl when her mask tears apart showing her face. It didn't seem she is giving her all anyway, as it's only a test. In the end, the group who monitors them looks satisfied, and decide that he passes the test. And that's how the new life of Zwei, the male character, began.
The episode closes with the continuation of the fight at the beginning, with both Zwei and Ein (the girl) easily finishing their mission by disposing the crime lord.
Impression:
While the first episode is not bad, it didn't felt that great either. Probably the main reason is at this point, it feels too similar to Noir and Madlax...
The pacing is a bit slow, even though it is artistically done.
The one aspect that save it is the music, which is great and very suitable to the action. If the story picks up, this might turn out to be interesting. Otherwise, those who hasn't seen Noir & other similar BEETRAIN shows might enjoy this more than those who has.
Opening theme song: KARMA by KOKIA
Ending theme song: Hell's gate 「地獄の門/Jigoku no Mon」 by ALI PROJECT
Official website: http://www.phantom-r.jp/
04 April 2009
Phantom ~Requiem for the Phantom~ 1: Awakening 「覚醒」
03 April 2009
Asura Cryin' EX 001:Asura Machina 『機巧魔神（アスラ・マキーナ）』
Based on a light novel series written by Gakuto Mikumo, at first glance this series has robots, magic, and girls as its main theme. Throw in a boy with amnesia, this sounds a lot like many other anime/RPG already out there. The first episode does hint that the story might become quite interesting, though.
The episode starts with a boy laying in a hospital, with a girl ghost watching over him, reassuring him everything will be ok. 3 years later, the same boy, whose name is Tomoharu Natsume, is about to enter high school. However, one day before the entrance ceremony, his mom let/makes him stay on his own in a large house! Reason? She just re-married (and wants time alone with her new husband:b). While his friend who is supposed to help him move in likes the idea, Tomoharu is more realistic as he is not too excited in responsibilities attached, such as cooking and washing clothes.
Instead of helping Tomoharu, his friend is more interested in looking for ghosts, without knowing there is one right in front of them all along. Surprisingly, Tomoharu actually knows the girl ghost, which is the same one as the one at the start of the episode.
Suddenly, a woman who knows Tomoharu's brother, who is studying in India, appears with a heavy suitcase and gives it to Tomoharu. The surprise is that she seems to be able to see Misao, the ghost!
The day does not end there. At night, a miko breaks into the house and demands something from Tomo, who has no clue what she wants. While she claims the item is dangerous, she does not seem to be the bad girl here, as she quickly retreats when she saw Misao.
First day at school, Tomoharu discovers what all anime fans would know by now, both the mysterious girl with suitcase and the miko are both in the same school:b
When he confronts the girl who looks like the intruder the night before, she denies any knowledge of him. As Tomoharu wonders whether she has a twin, the whole male population of the school does not seem to like his "too familiar approach with the girl". The girl actually has different eye colors to the intruder, so its either the twin theory is correct, or she must be able to transform. Of course, colored contact lenses is all the rage, it could be that too...:b
After school, Tomoharu goes to the science club to meet the briefcase girl, whose name is Kurosaki Shuri. She seems happy as she thinks Tomoharu wants to join, which is not the case at all here. However, by claiming that the club is started by Tomoharu's brother and promising to explain everything, the girl tries to coerce Tomoharu to join the club. Tomoharu declines though, asking for some time to think.
That night, his house become a battle ground for two opposing groups who wants the briefcase (and Shuri, who does not want Tomoharu to hand it over). In the end, she says the briefcase it Tomoharu's and ask him to open the briefcase by simply commanding it. While at first the briefcase seem to have nothing but dark liquid in it, a big robot appears out of the liquid, to the surprise of Tomoharu. The miko girl, who really likes to sneak out at night, seems to recognize it, and calls it Asura Machina...
Impression:
The first episode is quite good. There are lots of events covered and lots of things which are not explained yet, but it only adds to the mystery. As long this does not become a monster of the week kind of series or let the harem aspect dominates the story, this looks like a series worth following. In addition, the music is pretty good, and the main character seems likeable enough. While he does have amnesia, at least he can she Misao, the ghost.
Note: The english name seems to be Asura Cryin', but Asura Klein might be more correct. Any enlightened readers? Is it really a crying robot?:b
04 March 2009
Dragon Ball Kai 「ドラゴンボール改」
To commemorate the 20th anniversary of the broadcast of Dragon Ball Z, a remake of shorts is to start on April the 5th in Japan.
The remake, titled Dragon Ball Kai (Revision), is to be voiced by most of the original casts with a fewer number of episodes, hopefully the new "remake" will satisfy most Dragon Ball fans who are disappointed with the speed of the original anime series, like me! Only one month to go!
An event will also be held later this month (20th March) to promote the new series at the Tokyo International Anime Fair, where they will unveil the new opening song.
Official webiste: Dragon Ball Kai
09 October 2008
Toradora! 2:Ryuuji and Taiga
The story actually took an interesting turn here, unlike other series of similar genre, so that is a very nice surprise.
The story actually moved fairly quickly in this episode. At the start, Taiga is making many attempts to be noticed by her crush, but lady luck is not with her. During these times, Ryuuji is supporting her beyond even her expectation. However, the whole class ended up having the wrong impression that these two are dating. This depresses Taiga even more. Surprisingly, she made the decision that not only she will tell everyone they are wrong, she's going to confess to her crush the very next day.
Come the day after, Taiga accomplishes her goal! Unfortunately, the confession was rejected softly, while Ryuuji is watching from afar.
At the end, Ryuuji still offers his support, while Taiga doesn't plan to give up just yet.
While Taiga pretends she does not really care about Ryuuji, she actually looked happy about it when he is not watching.
Impression:
Unlike most series who has little progress story-wise even until the end, I consider Taiga's confession as a good sign that the story will not inevitably follow other series of this genre. Hopefully the story won't stall after this, but I am looking forward to see the next episode.
Highlight:Very glad that Taiga is not turning into Louise,at least not yet:b
Screenshots to follow....
05 October 2008
Tales of the Abyss 1:Prophecy World 「予言の世界」
Main character who wants to see the world. Wise friend. Period of amnesia. Unexpected attack on the palace. Mysterious girl. Teleported to a land far far away. The mysterious girl is actually a magician. Lots of level 1 beast to beat. And an expensive inn:b What does it all sum up to?
This time, its not a Japanese RPG, but an anime adaptation of the game:)
Strangely, I think my first paragraph pretty much cover most of the events in this first episode. I suppose graphics is why people would watch this first episode, so I will skip on a more elaborate summary.
Next episode: Third member of the party joins?:b
Impression:
The RPG that the anime was based on has good reputation. The Tales series has always had good anime cut scenes too. I always wished to have a longer cut scene, or the game play can be made to look something like those cut scenes. Well, this adaptation has a good start of showing what it is like if the cut scenes is extended to the whole story. The animation is excellent, so even if the story sprang no surprises, plenty of eye candy to savor. As long as the animation quality is consistent, and the story doesn't deviate much from the original, the series should come out good.
Tales of the Abyss 「手イルズオブジアビズ」 official site
Opening theme song: Karma 「カルマ」 by BUMP OF CHICKEN
Ending theme song: Adventure Comet 「冒険彗星 / Bouken Houkiboushi」 by Kurumi Enomoto 「榎本くるみ」
Kannagi 1: Shrine Maiden 「神籬の娘」
The episode covers most of the first chapter in the manga, with some extras. The airing time in Japan is actually different from most other anime. It's neither in the morning, night prime time, nor past midnight. While there doesn't seem to be anything unique about the series, I wonder what's the target age for it.
A child meets a shrine maiden. As a strong wind blows, the next thing he knows the girl has disappeared. After the opening scene with the dancing Nagi, the scene switches to a boy carving a statue from wood.
When he is about to go to school, the statue disintegrates, and a girl appears! No school today it seems! While the boy, Jin, wants to ask mountain loads of questions to the girl, the reverse is also true. When Jin ask whether the mysterious girl is a spirit, she punches him for his ignorance. She goes to a long winded explanation, which basically means she is a kind of goddess protector of the tree. Which makes her wonder what happens to the tree where she came from.
At the area where the tree is, the tree is gone! That means the wood that was used for carving by Jin originated from the tree that is now no more.
When the girl is still shocked by this, a centipede crawls onto her leg. I think she said it's not a normal centipede, and forbids Jin to touch it. Of course Jin then picks it up and throws it away. The centipede disintegrates, and he received a kick from our goddess.:)
Back at home, Jin wonders what to do now since it seems he now has to live with a girl for a while. He tries to divide house work, but as he explains the days of throwing the correct garbage (He should move away from Japan to make this simpler:b), he realize he would have to do everything initially.
As they watches a magic girl show on TV, the girl is inspired, and goes back to the stump of the tree where she used to live. Armed with a self-made magic stick, she does the transformation dance and exterminates some (spirit/impurity?) spiders. Happy on how things go, she revealed that her name is Nagi.
Next is some bath scenes (mandatory for these genre, I guess), which is quite funny too. And no, they didn't take a bath together:b Jun warns Nagi not to take the phone when he is taking a bath, but while he is enjoying her bath, he heard the phone rings twice and then stopped. Freaking out, he sprints to the phone with only a towel covering him. Thankfully, he managed to speak to his classmate before Nagi speaks. His classmate is wondering if he caught a cold or something since he missed school today. After the conversation, due to standing with no clothes, he sneezes:b
And finally, the long day ends. During the night, Jin awoke due to some noise. When he wonders what it is, he realize that goddesses needs to go to the bathroom too:)
Impression:
Nothing that has done been done before numerous times, but for some reason I like the first episode. Probably having a likable main male and female characters has got to do with a lot of it. Also the jokes are simple, and not overdone.
Kannagi 「かんなぎ」 official site
Opening theme song: motto☆hade ni ne! 「もっと☆派手にね！」 by Tomatsu Haruka 「戸松遥」
Ending theme: Musuhi no toki 「産巣日の時」 by Tomatsu Haruka 「戸松遥」
Note: screen shots to follow
03 October 2008
Kuro Shitsuji 1:That butler, has skills 「その執事、有能」
Based on a highly popular manga of the same name, the anime follows the story of a boy, Ciel, and his highly skillful butler, Sebastian.
From the start, Ciel seems like quite a brat, randomly throwing darts to people around him. His demeanor doesn't seem to affect Sebastian, who can handle his master quite easily.
Next, the other servants in the household are introduced, and they all look grossly incompetent:b. Thankfully there is always Sebastian that can save the day.
When there is a guest who comes to discuss a business deal with Ciel, Sebastian quickly makes a plan to cover up the messy state of the mansion.
It turns out the guest is actually trying to take advantage of Ciel, as he thinks the boy is just a kid. Sebastian, who has some powers, is making the guest stumble through the mansion which now appears haunted. The guest leaves in a hurry, and Ciel is saved from his trickery.
Highlight: the cute animation that accompanies the ending theme
Impression:
The animation looks very good and the story looks intriguing so far. Probably the series will be mostly episodic, with the progress of the story introduced bit by bit.
Kuroshitsuji 「黒執事」official site
Opening theme: Kiss of Monochrome 「モノクロのキス」 by SID 「シド」
Ending theme: I'm ALIVE! by BECCA
Shirakawa-go and Higurashi no naku koro ni
Hayate no Gotoku!! Second Season
