Webcomic Week: END

So, this is a bit late but I doubt anyone really reads this blog so I'll just cover all the remaining comics I read online.  The remaining webcomics I read are: Flaky Pastry, Sinfest, Girls with Slingshots (NSFW), and Menage a 3 (NSFW).  Flaky Pastry is a fun webcomic about a bunch of different 'magical' girls and their lives in an apartment/college.  By 'magical' I mean elves, dwarves, catgirls, androids, etc.  It is actually quite fun and is updated on Fridays.  Sinfest is a comic about life including the Devil and God of Christian beliefs, but also has characters like Buddha interacting with a host of characters.  The style is quite cartoony and mainly black and white but is updated daily, including Saturdays and with a full color page on Sundays as of late.  There is a lot of diversity in the characters and their interactions so I find that one a quick and refreshing daily read.  Girls with Slingshots is...NSFW.  That pretty much sums it up, same goes for Menage a 3.  Girls with slingshots deals with lesbianism and other adult topics along with the nature of post college graduates and how life goes.  It is updated Monday through Friday.  The art is quite good but I definitely wouldn't recommend it if you don't like foul language and adult situations in cartoon form.  Menage a 3 deals heavily with the issue of bisexuality and homosexuality, both male and female.  The main premise is the main character is a virgin and gets two female roommates when his two former roommates turn out to be gay and move out.  It is updated Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday.  Pretty much that wraps up all of the webcomics I read currently.  If I begin to read other comics, they'll likely appear in WDs which will start up again soon...ish.  With that I hope you enjoyed webcomic week and if you like the site, keep reading when I post.

--CsMiREK

Webcomic Week Days 4 and 5

So I didn't put up a new webcomic yesterday because I just moved in to my new dorm room, which btw is quite nice.  Instead, I will be putting up two comics today.  The two I have for you are Para-Ten and The Meek.  Para-Ten is a story about a young girl named Paveline who is separated from her brother in an accident and who then makes it her goal to make it back to her home.  Along her journeys she encounters many things and meets many people.  At least that's the premise.  Para-Ten has only been actively running in its current form for 3 chapters, but it looks like it'll be a fun and enjoyable ride.  Also, the art is absolutely gorgeous.  Unlike most of the other comics, Para-Ten is done with brush art so it has a much different feel to it from normal inked comics.  In any case Para-Ten is definitely a good comic and one you should read if you love good art.
The Meek is also a comic in its third chapter but the true story does not seem to have built itself up quite yet.  In the first chapter we have a young girl much like Paveline who needs to go find a city on the bequest of her "grandfather".  However, chapter 2 takes you to a whole different place and chapter 3 does the same.  Regardless, the art is quite good and the storytelling itself is done in quite good taste so I have no complaints of that nature.  While I personally enjoyed Para-Ten more, The Meek is also shaping up to be quite a good comic and definitely worth a view.

--CsMiREK

Webcomic Week Day 3

To continue Webcomic Week, I present to you Dr. McNinja.  As you might imagine the comic is about a doctor who also happens to be a ninja, what could possibly go wrong with a premise like that?  Add in a gorilla sidekick, more ninjas, Ben Franklin clones, vampires, cowboys, and raptors and you've got Dr. McNinja in a nutshell.  Oh, and pirates, there are pirates too.  Like Hanna, Dr. McNinja is arranged in sets similar to Hanna's chapters but longer and not placed as closely chronologically, hard to tell I suppose though.  Dr. McNinja has great art and is updated MWF with relative consistency although they sometimes appear a day late.  There's a lot of humor and awesome art, not to mention ninjas.  I recommend reading from the start, but that only really gives backstories on characters so picking a story to start off is just as good.  Stay tuned for more Webcomic Week and enjoy Dr. McNinja.

--CsMiREK

Webcomic Week Day 2

For the second day of Webcomics Week, I will be introducing the first webcomic that I read regularly, Questionable Content (QC).  Unlike Happle Tea or Hanna, QC focuses more on the mundane parts of the world.  Calling it a simple boy meets girl comic wouldn't do it justice since the author, Jeph Jacques, likes to add a lot of girls into his story.  I won't spoil it, but he doesn't end up with the girl you think he will at the beginning.  In any case, my favorite part of the comic is that you can see the author's drawing style grow and evolve from the beginning to its current art.  Also, he has a good number of interesting characters who are mainly female, of which most work in the fictional coffee shop "Coffee of Doom".  It is also good to note that this is one of the longest running and popular webcomics that I read.  The author also makes a living off the comic from selling merchandise and ad space, a dream for many a budding artist.  In any case, Questionable Content is a great comic and hey, you don't have to read it if you don't want to.  My words only mean so much after all.  QC updates every weekday and is something you should definitely check out if you have the time.  Another note, QC might not be the most work safe comic, much less so than Happle Tea at the least.

--CsMiREK

Webcomic Week Day 1

Considering that this site has mainly been about anime and music, I thought I'd add more content.  Thus  "Webcomic Week" is born.  Everyday this week, starting today of course, I will talk about a webcomic that I read.  Each comic will come with links, posted on the side soon.  Today I will be talking about Happle Tea and Hanna Is Not A Boy's Name.
First off is Happle Tea which is loosely based off of various aspects of mythology from around the world.  From God in cat form to Sasquatch to Ilmarinen and the forging of the Sampo, the author Scott Maynard covers many things.  There really is no plot to the comic, so if that's your thing, this is a great comic and lots of fun.  It's also pretty informative and has decent art.  Happle Tea updates on Tuesdays and Fridays with pretty good consistency.  So be sure to check that out if you are into that kinda thing.
Next is Hanna Is Not A Boy's Name which is about a 24 year old guy named Hanna and his zombie sidekick who deal in paranormal investigations.  Out of all of the comics I read, this is the most recent one I've read; I started yesterday, yet is definitely one of my favorites.  The art is very good and clean with a very modern American comic look.  Also zombies, vampires, werewolves, and the sort are always a plus when done this well.  I also like the way the author, Tessa Stone, lets the zombie sidekick do the narrating.  Having a zombie narrator is quite novel and he makes the comic quite fun when contrasted with Hanna's craziness.  The main downside of this comic is that it does not update regularly like the rest of the comics I will be posting.  However, the art is good enough that I don't care.  Anyways if you're into crazy art and zombies/vampires, this is definitely a comic for you.  Until summer anime season ends, expect more random posts like this and I hope you find these two comics as enjoyable as I do.

--CsMiREK

It's a sad day...

So, it's my first post in a month and this one has a pretty grim tone.  3 days ago, that's August 24th if you are too lazy to subtract or happen to read this in say...a year, Satoshi Kon died.  If you aren't away of who Satoshi Kon is, he was a famous anime director famous for such titles as Paprika(2006) and Paranoia Agent, a slightly disturbing 13 episode anime that at one point ran on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim.  He was a pretty powerful figure in the anime world and died while working on his 5th movie.  I feel kinda bad not having seen most of his works so throughout the course of this blog you might see some of them pop up in WDs or elsewhere.  He left his last words, translated in English at this site, and I think that we should admire his strength considering he knew he was living on borrowed time due to incurable pancreatic cancer.  My advice is to check out his works, even if you have to do it illegally.  From what I've seen, they are quite thought provoking and tell pretty amazing stories, regardless of how surreal they are.  To compound on Satoshi Kon's death, there were 2 deaths amongst Japanese DJs that I thought I would point out, Nujabes and KAGAMI.  Nujabes, or Jun Seba, would probably be best known for his work in Samurai Champloo to anime viewers and he died in February of 2010 in a motor vehicle accident; his last.fm page is here.  KAGAMI or Takashi Yasumi was a DJ who did a couple of tracks for the anime Eureka 7 and who worked with bands like ORANGE RANGE, his last.fm page is here.  Remember all, humans live only a short while and if you do great things, people will remember you.  Hopefully, I'll be posting normally again soonish but I wouldn't count on it.

--CsMiREK

WD6 : Gankutsuou

Whether you care if this is a day late or not, here is WD6.  This week's weekly discovery is actually an anime by the name of Gankutsuou.  Gankutsuou originally aired in the fall of 2004 and winter 2005.  It is 24 episodes and is loosely based on Alexandre Dumas famous novel The Count of Monte Cristo, which is a novel I recommend you read if you're not into anime although if that were the case I'm not sure why you're here.  With some pretty stunning graphics, strange ones too, and a pretty good plot, I found Gankutsuou to be a pretty good anime overall.  While it's true that people of Dumas' time did not have say...giant robots or spaceships, I think that this is a good description of what a future Count of Monte Cristo would look like.  I would rank this up in some of my higher ranked anime titles due to the art and the plot even if that plot is largely based off a novel.  You can stream this anime from animenewsnetwork.com and from cruchyroll.com legally.  Also, I will not be doing anymore first episode reviews this season.  Either I found I didn't want to watch the remainder or they will make an appearance on my final review list or a possible quick appearance in a soon to be post.  That is all and I hope you've all been enjoying the summer as it rolls into August.

--CsMiREK

PU2: Back at home

Time for another personal update.  I am officially back home from California and it's pretty hot here.  Personally, I don't really mind it too much but the humidity is quite awful I must admit.  In any case, some last things about San Francisco and California.  Unlike my last meal in Hong Kong, which was at Pizza Hut if you don't remember, my last meal in California was at the Cheescake Factory.  An interesting note, there are no Cheescake Factories in the state I live in.  I did not take any pictures of my meal but I did take a picture of the slice of cheescake I ate.  For your information it is white chocolate caramel macadamia nut. 

In case you're wondering, that single slice is 1280 calories and cost over $7, truly frightening.  However, cost-wise I saw much scarier things during my stay.  In Chinatown I went to a place that sells herbs and I think these prices might be a "little" off.

Now, I'm not quite sure what cordyceps are, but if they're worth $9600/lb they must be insanely rare or insanely good for you.  Saddest thing is I saw something at a different store worth $18000/lb, some sort of Chinese ginseng or something like that.  Anyways, now that I'm back home, expect more pictures from here and since I only have 1 or 2 more sets of anime left, expect more randomness and less anime soon.  There'll be even more pictures when I feel like putting them up so enjoy.  Also, there will not be a WD this week because I don't feel like it.

--CsMiREK

Summer2010 First Episode Review: Highschool of the Dead and WD5

Highschool of the Dead
rating: zombies/10

So, if you couldn't get the hint from the picture and my rating, Highschool of the Dead is an anime about zombies.  There really isn't much more to say than that.  For a serious rating, I would probably give a 7 or 7.5 since the animation is really quite good.  Other than that, expect standard fare in terms of plot when dealing with zombie outbreaks.  Oh and expect boobs, the manga this anime was based off of is heavy on the boobs, as you can see from this picture from the OP.

Checklist: Girl with large boobs who uses a katana, check.  Zombies, check.  Genius girl, check.  Fat guy who knows about guns, check.  Guy and girl with some sort of childhood relation, check.  Well, that's pretty much everything you could hope for right?  Anyways, I have read what's out of the manga for this and I can say, it will get better even if this first episode seemed a bit on the mediocre side so yes, I will be watching this one too, what's that now...4 or 5 anime this season?  Well, enough of that, time for Weekly Discovery.

This week's Weekly Discovery is Kishida Kyoudan since they are the ones who did the OP to Highschool of the Dead.  Kishida Kyoudan is another doujin group, this time straight rock, who started with Touhou, a game, music remixes and arrangements.  The main vocalist is named ichigo and well, their sound is very distinctive.  When I heard the OP to Highschool of the Dead, I looked for a total of...2 minutes and found the right artist sitting pretty in my music library.  Here is a youtube link to the Highschool of the Dead OP and here's one for my crossfade of some of their other tracks.  Oh, you will also notice that a lot of places will list this artist as Kishida Kyoudan and the Akeboshi Rockets, but I really don't care that much and I'm too lazy to fix my music tags anymore.  I hope you enjoy and there is more anime to cover in the upcoming days.

--CsMiREK

Summer2010 First Episode Reviews: Occult Gakuen and Shiki

Now it's time for more reviews.  Up today is the horror corner, a staple of all summer TV and movies, although not quite as much as in the past.  I'll be covering 3 animes in 2 posts, so pay attention.


Occult Gakuen
Rating: 7.5/10

Occult Gakuen is odd.  We get a main female lead, Maya, who goes to a school that her father has been building to study the occult to be the new headmaster.  Apparently, he has died and he left her to run the place.  Unfortunately, she hates the occult for breaking apart her family since well...her father left her to build the school.  That said, I found the first episode promising yet sadly unfulfilling.  The beginning starts off with some strange operation that supposedly takes place in the future, 2012 if you can believe it.  Then we get introduced to Maya.  She has the usual cool demeanor with heavy disdain in her father, but carries father issues, how original.  In any case, she goes to the school to see her father's funeral where of course something has to go wrong.  In this case, he rises from the dead like this:

This of course begs the question: How do you stop a crazy old man zombie thingy?  Well the answer is like this:

If you can't tell, that's a chair she's holding and he is flying at her in some supernatural way that apparently only fat old zombie-esque men can handle.  Anyways, we figure out what he actually has become and she defeats him only to see a naked man come from the sky, likely the man from the future.  Another note, what is up with Japanese people lately and adding random naked man appearances, see Eden of the East, I recommend that one personally.  Regardless of that, this series looks promising and I am likely to follow it this season.  You can stream it from cruncyroll.com as well a week after it actually comes out.

Shiki
Rating: 6.75/10

Shiki is the other anime of this post.  Personally, I found this one a bit odd.  You will notice at the end that the pictures for this one are a bit on the boring side.  The first episode felt like a mash up trying to introduce a whole host of characters without focusing on the task at hand.  Not the worst thing you can do, but not the best either.  That said, Shiki takes place in a place called Sotoba and revolves around a series of mysterious deaths.  We see three at the beginning with some rather disturbing corpses for example.  We also meet a young girl, Megumi, who is lovestruck with a guy from the city and is also sick of living in her country bumpkin town.  The only thing she likes about the place is the guy and a castle that is situated in the town.  Of course, this castle is a focal point of the story as the new tenants move in and young Megumi must go see them.  She then disappears and dies at the end of the episode.  Did I spoil it for you?  Well, too bad but I do have to give props to them for killing someone off in the first episode so blatantly.  In addition, the music is composed by Takanashi Yasuharu, the same guy who composed for another horror anime, Jigoku Shoujo, which turned out to have amazing music.  With that, I think that I will continue watching this one for a bit even if I think the character designs are a bit funky.  Enjoy the pictures and stay tuned for the last anime of the day, Highschool of the Dead.

--CsMiREK

On fireworks and Ents

So, a few days ago was July 4th which as all Americans know means fireworks.  To that end, I bring you pictures from a fireworks show in California, which is not where I live.  I decided that since I took so many pictures, I would just let you view them all at your own discretion.  Here is the link to the folder.  Notice here that there is a "image gallery view" button, might be useful if you intend to look at all of them.
In other news, I was talking to a friend of mine who suffers from chronic nosebleeds and she mentioned getting an appointment with an ENT specialist.  Now, while I know that that stands for ear, nose, and throat, I couldn't help but think about the Ents from J.R.R Tolkien's Lord of the Rings.  The idea of being an Ent specialist intrigued me.  Although they aren't real, it'd be fun to say "I specialize in giant, talking trees.  What do YOU do?" while the opposing party stands agape, trying to determine whether I'm insane or awesome.  Anyways, that's all for this break from anime, I've still got a lot of anime to cover so don't expect anymore randomness for a while.  Also, here's the wikipedia link on Ents if you're interested.  Enjoy the pictures, they took forever to upload.  Also notice that I have added links on the side, in the future more stuff will go there but for now is my last.fm page which shows what I'm listening to at pretty much any time of day.

--CsMiREK

Summer2010 First Ep Reviews: Mitsudomoe, Seitokai Yakuindomo, Shufuku no Campanella

So to kick off the first episode reviews are the three anime: Mitsudomoe, Seitokai Yakuindomo, and Shufuku no Campanella.  Style-wise I will be rating each anime from 1-10 as usual, perhaps with some odd ratings consisting of words over 10, which will go on to a brief on my thoughts of each first episode.


Mitsudomoe
rating: 7/10

Mitsumodoe appears to be an anime about a set of triplets, Hitoha, Mitsuba, and Futaba Marui, and their 6th grade teacher, Satoshi Yabe.  At first glance, you might just brush that off as being somewhat stereotypical or already done, see Kodomo no Jikan, however, then you find out about the three sisters' strange traits.  Hitoha reads pornographic literature, Futaba is a perverted yet super strong girl, and Mitsuba has a penchant for sadism.  All the while, Yabe is trying to cope with their complete oddity.  Personally I found this anime pretty fun and I am somewhat likely to continue since I do not see any chance of say loli tendencies, just strange comedy made stranger by little kids.  I'd say that the weirdest thing about the animation is that they look like hamsters with their teeth like that, but oh well.  The OP is a bit on the squeaky side, not to my taste but the ED is actually pretty decent and mellow.  Well, here are your pictures.  If you can't make sense of them, watch the anime and see.

Seitokai Yakuindomo
rating: 7/10

Continuing along the vein of perverted comedy, we have Seitokai Yakuindomo.  We get a pretty generic plot, guy gets thrown into a school that used to be girls only but just recently became co-ed.  We then meet the student council who promptly gets said guy, in this case Takatoshi Tsuda, to join as say...vice president on the all female student council and we continue on with the anime.  Interestingly enough, we do not see much of a chance of romance in the first episode, but who knows.  As for comedic style, it is mainly made up of short punchline type gags, which is in a sense a bit refreshing, but maybe that's just me.  The OP is kinda catchy and is definitely tailored to the anime and the ED is by angela with a more pop sound, still pretty interesting though.  Chances are pretty high that I will continue watching this one since well...I like comedy animes and this one was pretty funny, if a bit on the dirty side.

Shufuku no Campanella
rating: 3/10

So, this anime is based off of a Japanese ero game and personally, I kinda wish I didn't watch it.  I found myself wondering, why do people like things like this?  Oh and another note, I will note put up pictures for anything I rate below 5/10 because it's a waste of my time.  Well, I suppose you want an actual review.  Meh, I'm too lazy to do one.  Plus, it appears that even my computer doesn't like it.  I can't open the file anymore apparently.  Divine intervention perhaps? and no I am not a religious person.  Anyways, if you want an actual review head over to animenewsnetwork.com where you will see equally bleh reviews.  With that, that's all for this post, stay tuned for more reviews in the coming days.

--CsMiREK

Summer 2010 First Episode Reviews: Overview

Ok, I really wanted this post up yesterday, but I got lazy so here it is today instead.  This post will deal with the overview of what I am trying to accomplish with first episode reviews and will also be a place to view all of the first episode reviews.  Notice that there is a new label: overview.  Each of these will direct to a page like this one for each of the anime seasons that I cover, both first episode reviews and full series reviews.  This means that I will make a new page for the spring 2010 full reviews in a short time, or convert a post.
Anyways, my goal for first episode reviews is to help both me and you decide which animes are worth a watch each season.  I will not put up reviews for sequels, kid's shows, BL(boys love) related anime, or anything I find unappealing at a glance.  That said, I will cover many, many anime from action to romance, shoujo to shounen.  I will likely have 1-4 pictures per anime I cover and a short blurb on the OP/ED if relevant.  I will also include where you can stream each anime if relevant and of course my thoughts on the anime and whether or not I think I will follow it until the end.  Each post will be broken into 2 or 3 different animes so I do not make too many posts or too long of posts.  With that, let anime season summer 2010 begin.

--CsMiREK

Weekly Discovery: Week 4

Sorry, I really meant to put this up yesterday but July 4th is just one of those holidays that eats American's lives, something about fireworks is too appealing to not watch.  In any case, this week's WD is on the last of the 3 doujin Gothic artists that I am gonna talk about for now, Rokugen Alice (六弦アリス).  Rokugen Alice is a duo consisting of Anna Sakurai on vocals and who does the songwriting and 六弦A助 (Rokugen Asuke) doing arranging and background things.  In addition, on one album they had vocalists from other doujin groups like Alieson, Queen of Wand, and Ether as vocalists.  The sound is a bit different from MiddleIsland and Asriel.  There is a much stronger drum beat in general and in my opinion, the sound is much more fitting of the Gothic genre than either of the other two.  Another thing to note is the large amount of strings used, from violins to cellos while still having really strong guitar lines.  Something else that is interesting to note is that the order that I ordered these last three WDs is in the reverse order of when I first found each artist as Rokugen Alice was the first one I heard, a little less than 3 years ago now.  The crossfade this time is made up of 15 different tracks and is not quite as good as the one for Asriel, but also does not have the clipping.  So, I guess that it is up to you to say which one is better.  Their site is http://www.rokugen.net/ and has crossfades for all of their albums, if I remember correctly.  This is my crossfade of some of my favorite tracks.  Enjoy and stay tuned for the start of summer 2010 anime first episode reviews which will begin appearing today or tomorrow.


--CsMiREK

Spring 2010 Review: Durarara!!

Ok, the title is a bit misleading since Durarara!! started during the winter season back in January.  However, it did end this season and that is why it is here.  I would call Durarara!! a supernatural action mystery anime.  Yes, that is a bit long winded and over the top, but I do not believe you can get a better description of the genre than that.
Durarara!! centers in a part of Tokyo called Ikebukuro.  It follows the lives of various people who each have their own influence on the city.  The first characters we meet are Ryuugamine Mikado and his best friend from elementary school Kida Masaomi.  While Mikado is from out of town, he quickly gets engulfed by the mysteries of Ikebukuro, from supposedly headless riders to giant black Russian men.  He learns of a "colorless" gang called the Dollars who have found their way into Ikebukuro, different from the color gangs of before the Yellow Scarves and the Blue Square.  By the end of the 24 episode anime, the cast gets fully fleshed out, which is always a plus.  Furthermore, there is a sense of mystery and anxiousness that leaves you wanting more, even at the end.
While I believe the characters are absolutely amazing, the plot is also great.  There are plenty of twists and turns with plenty of surprises, even for the most astute of anime watchers.  It is my belief that part of Durarara!!'s charm lies in its ability to feel timeless, as if everything is moving perfectly with both dragging and rushing placed strategically in place.  Since Durarara!! is based off a light novel, a novel with pictures basically, and this series only covered 3 out of the 7 out it is my belief that we may see more Durarara!! in the future and I would personally be looking forward to it.
In addition to the plot, I found the animation style nice and clean.  There was little if any CG which I found nice since CG can seriously ruin good anime, for example Fairy Tail.  The action scenes are smooth and reminiscent of some of the best action anime out while keeping the nice clean look of Durarara!!
For music, the 2 OPs/EDs were all amazing, easily some of the best OPs/EDs I have heard in a long time.  From the pop/jazz feel of the first OP to the pop of the first ED to the powerful sound of the second OP and similarly good second ED, we get a pretty complete anime able to be watched from start to end.  I often skip the OP/ED so having an anime like that once in a while is a very good thing for me.  In addition, the soundtrack is similarly amazing for the anime.  While I found a copy online, I must say that as strict listening it is not all that great, but in context it makes the anime all that much stronger.  With both haunting tracks and fast paced tracks only fit for action, there is nothing out of place or done badly.  Listening to the soundtrack by itself made me realize just how amazing it was, able to enhance the anime without being intruding which actually reminded me of Samurai Champloo interestingly enough.
In any case, if you are gonna watch any anime of winter/spring 2010 I would strongly suggest Durarara!!  There is comedy, a bit of romance, and a lot of awesome.  I suppose not everyone feels the same way I do, but that is not for me to decide, now is it?  The next post is a WD then it is onto the start of the summer 2010 first episode review madness.
For some extra fun, let us look at something interesting about this season:

If you do not wanna click the pictures, the top three are all played by the same seiyuu or voice actor, Daisuke Ono, the next 4 are all played by Hiroshi Kamiya, and the bottom two are played by Jun Fukuyama, the same person who voices Lelouch from Code Geass.  In order, the animes affiliated with each picture from left to right, sorry the pictures are set funny, are Giant Killing,  Working!!, Durarara!!, Working!!, Arakawa Under the Bridge, Durarara!!, Angel Beats!, Durarara!!, and Working!!  Notice that all three voice actors played roles in both Working!! and Durarara!!, must have been busy for them.  In any case, time to give my ratings of Durarara!!

Overall: 9.5/10
Amongst its genre whatever it is: 9.8/10 (yea, that is right, 9.8)
*Note: you can stream Durarara!! off of crunchyroll.com

--CsMiREK

Spring 2010 Dual-Review: Tatami Galaxy and K-ON!!

This review is on the first half of K-ON!! and the Tatami Galaxy, expect the review for Durarara!! to come very soon, 2-3 days and the first first episode reviews of summer 2010 to come out the same day or the day after.
I will start with K-ON!! and go to the Tatami Galaxy later on.  K-ON!! is actually the second season of the popular slice-of-life anime K-ON! that originally aired in spring 2009.  For those who have not watched that, this is irrelevant and I am likely to never do sequels again in reviews.  In any case, I feel that K-ON!! is a bit worse than its first season counterpart.  There is less of the charm that the original series had and the OP is a bit more annoying.  As much as I would like there to be some sort of plot, this is not likely to happen as I am suspicious that Japan is using K-ON to brainwash people.  Personally, if you did not like the first series, you will not like this one and if you liked the first series, I still have my doubts that you would like it.  There is little character growth and more cutesy than I would like and it almost sickens me, almost.  I will likely continue to the end unless the summer season is really good, since I get bored easily.
Now I will move onto the Tatami Galaxy.  The Tatami Galaxy or Yojōhan Shinwa Taikei is an anime based off a novel.  It follows the main character, of whom we never get the name, and his college years.  Each episode is basically a rehashing of him going through his college experience in a variety of clubs and ending in some sort of catastrophe.  Each episode also involves the main antagonist, a strange creature of a man named Ozu, who literally leads to the main character's demise in every episode in some way shape or form.  There are other characters who pop up, but those are the big two.  A big feature of this anime in particular is the sense of deja vu that you get from watching every episode.  As a result, I could not actually continually watch this series.  The OP is done by Asian Kung-Fu Generation but sounds like pop music so I actually really hate it, the ED is a sort of electric synth pop that is actually pretty decent.  The music is also pretty good but does not hide the fact that the art is definitely for the type of people who enjoy artsy anime.  In addition, the characters speak at a crazy fast pace and it is hard to keep up at times.
Sorry if this post seems like a giant ramble, my thoughts do not seem to be quite in order right now.  In any case Durarara!! is next on the review list and a weekly discovery is coming up tomorrow as well.

K-ON!!
overall: 7.5/10
Tatami Galaxy
overall: 6.5/10
*Note: you can stream tatami galaxy from funimation and hulu.com

--CsMiREK

Spring 2010 Review: Sarai-ya Goyou

I am getting seriously behind so I rushed to finish this series and dropped the Tatami Galaxy which will get a brief along with K-ON!! next post.  Sarai-ya Goyou or House of Five Leaves is a samurai period type anime, so if that is in your interest zone, pay attention to this post.
As stated, Sarai Goyou is a samurai period type anime taking place in Edo.  As far as being an action anime...it definitely is not.  On the contrary, I would place it under the drama category and definitely an anime for the more mature of audiences.  There is not a lot of flashy movement or amazing animation, but the plot and motion behind the scenes of the characters is quite intriguing.
As the last paragraph was not a synopsis, I will give it here.  In this anime, we have the typical cowardly samurai, Akitsu Masanosuke, as the main character paired with a strong willed and mysterious white haired man, Yaichi, and his organization, the Goyou or Five Leaves.  Since Akitsu is such a cowardly samurai, we find him jobless and approached by Yaichi who takes a keen interest in him.  His organization makes money by kidnapping people, something that Akitsu does not particularly feel is right.  However, he finds himself drawn to this strange white haired man.  As the series continues we learn more about their pasts and those of the other people in the organization.
If that synopsis sounded boring...well, this is not an anime for you.  The other reason is that I find it hard to briefly summarizes animes without giving too many spoilers.  In any case, Sarai-ya Goyou is a tough anime for me to place.  While expecting a lot of action as a samurai anime, there is instead a lot of drama.  While expecting clean and pure fighting type animation, there is an almost artsy and dark animation style.  Truly, it is an anime for the curious and for those whose view of anime is that of an art form.
Onto music, I would place this as having the best score of the season.  Perhaps I am biased as I am a sucker for a good bit of accordion or accordion-type instrumentation, but the musical score is definitely solid.  While it tends to intrude a bit more than most animes, it comes in at exactly the right moments to help in furthering some point or relating certain scenes.  On the other hand, the OP/ED are a bit bleh.  The ED in particular I found did not fit at all and the OP was a bit mediocre in animation and in sound.   However, all in all I would say that Sarai-ya Goyou ended up a decent anime with a good solid plot.  Next up is a dual post on K-ON!! and the Tatami Galaxy.

Overall: 8/10
Amongst drama anime: 7/10
*Note: You can stream Sarai-ya Goyou from the Funimation website and Hulu.com

--CsMiREK

Spring 2010 Review: Arakawa Under the Bridge

Ok, since the summer 2010 season is getting into full swing, I thought that I should try to quickly wrap-up the spring 2010 season.  First off in this giant review section is the comedy Arakawa Under the Bridge.
Arakawa Under the Bridge is a comedy centering around the main character Ichinomiya Kou, note that all spellings of names are variable to subbing groups, and his interactions with the strange denizens of Arakawa bridge.  To be more precise, the denizens of under Arakawa bridge, hence the title.  From a girl who believes she is from Venus and fishes for a living to people in star masks and kappa costumes, it is quite obvious that this is a character driven anime.  Character to character interactions are quite powerful and quite hilarious.  Unlike the other character driven anime of the season Working!!, Arakawa does gain a plot for a bit yet quickly gets over it.  If you find yourself watching Arakawa, just do not expect a lot of plot overall, just crazy madness.
Well, that said, Arakawa Under the Bridge would probably be best classified as an anime adapted from a "gag manga".  This means that a lot of its humor can be contextual and a bit different from other comedy animes.  Even so, I had a lot of fun with it and am looking forward to the second season, it is already confirmed for a second season.  I liked the interaction between the main character Kou and his female counterpart Nino as they grew to love each other.  I liked how all the other characters complemented the craziness of the anime and showed how a stubborn person can change their attitude, even if it is a slow process.  Overall, I liked the anime very much and as far as comedies go, I do not know much better if you like crazy randomness.
Onto the OP/ED and music.  The OP is a bit strange, but it definitely is not the worst you can do.  If the voice did not do some strange things, it actually would have been a very good OP, as it stands it is just pretty good.  The ED is also pretty good and I do not really have much to say since I do not usually watch the ED.  The music is far from memorable but complements the anime quite well and if I got my hands on the soundtrack I am sure I would find something worth listening to.  Also, yes I do end sentences with prepositions, I am aware and you shouldn't say anything.
I am definitely sure that I have not said everything about Arakawa Under the Bridge that I want, but it suffices to say that the animation quality is good and the comedy aspects are awesome for me.  If you are looking for something light and fun but do not want to go so far as watching Working!!, Arakawa Under the Bridge is a pretty good option.  Also, for fans of Bleach and in particular Zaraki, the person who voices him is the narrator and a character who appears in the last episode.  It is pretty funny hearing that voice on such a different character.  I intended to put up pictures, but I got lazy, so you get nothing.  Expect reviews for Sarai Goyou, Durarara!!, the Tatami Galaxy, and a mid for K-ON!! in the next few hours to tomorrow.  Then the summer 2010 first episode madness can truly begin.

Overall: 9/10
Among comedy anime: 9/10

--CsMiREK

On food in Hong Kong (food)

Wow, I actually wrote these last few updates on the flight back to the US.  At the time I'm writing this it is 2:25 AM in Hong Kong yet I'm perfectly awake for some reason.  In any case, this is about food in Hong Kong.
There is a lot of food in Hong Kong and I really do mean that.  From fast food to family diners to full out world class restaurants, there is a lot of food here.  I think that if you really like food and all kinds of it, especially Chinese food, that Hong Kong is an absolutely great place for you.  However, besides Chinese food there is also Indian curry places, Japanese, Korean, and many other places that I didn't have a chance to even see.  For this post, I'm gonna focus on a single restaurant I went to towards the beginning of my stay, general pricing, and fast food because well...because I'm American and fast food is a part of our lives whether we like it or not.
When it comes to world class restaurants, there is a particular rating that is known worldwide for labeling the world's finest restaurants.  This system is the system of Michelin stars.  A single restaurant can have up to 3 Michelin stars, but even having one is an amazing feat and shows the prominence of a restaurant.  While I did not go to a 3 star Michelin restaurant, I did go to a 1 star Michelin restaurant towards the beginning of my stay.  The restaurant's name was Din Tai Fung and served Chinese food.  Now, having grown up on Chinese food, I didn't really have many expectations, but I was sorely wrong.  The food there was quite easily the best Chinese food I have ever had.  Without a doubt, I do believe in that Michelin star and the quality that must come from having one.  I won't go into what I actually ate since trying to describe it would be boring for both you and me, I'm sure of that since I don't have that kind of vocabulary nor that kind of skill when talking about food.
Anyways, I'd like to do a quick bit on pricing of food and meals in Hong Kong.  Generally, you get quite a lot of food for a pretty small amount of money.  For example, at a family diner you can get breakfast or lunch for around 20-40 HKD which comes out to $2.50-5 US.  A lot of places serve curry and both rice and noodles are popular at these sorts of family diners.  Most menus have English, so if you aren't quite sure what you're ordering you can look at pictures or if there isn't English, ask for an English menu.
Last on this post is fast food.  While in Hong Kong, I had fast food a total of twice.  I had McDonald's once, and I earlier said that my last meal was at Pizza Hut, although it's debatable whether Pizza Hut is considered fast food or not.  In any case, I'll talk about McDonald's first then in another paragraph talk about Pizza Hut and my last meal in Hong Kong.  Ok, first off McDonald's is actually quite popular in Hong Kong.  Perhaps not as much as in the US, but still pretty popular.  Particularly, chicken nuggets are popular.  Just recently they added more flavors of dipping sauces, and some of them are actually pretty good.  They also have a stupid mascot for those new dipping sauces, but I won't talk about that, if you care his name is Dimjack and you'd look up Hong Kong with his name.  Price-wise, McDonald's is actually cheaper in comparison than in the US, at least when currency is translated.  It's cheaper by about a dollar or so, regardless of whether the drink happens to be a bit small.  The actual amount of food is pretty much the same.  They also happen to have strange regional items as shown in the picture below as I'm too lazy to explain them.

Finally, my last meal in Hong Kong.  Pizza Hut in Hong Kong seems to be pretty ritzy.  The restaurants are really fancy and the food is pretty different from normal pizzas.  Quite frankly, I don't like having to eat appetizers and such since they make me full too quickly and then I can't eat my actual meal.  However, in this case I'm glad, I didn't really like the pizza I ate.  It was some new Tapas pizza thingy without tomato sauce and I'm too lazy to explain and a picture's worth 1000 words so here:

No your eyes aren't deceiving you, those are octopus legs you see and shrimp.  Needless to say, it was an interesting pizza, even if I didn't particularly like eating it.  Also, if you ever see this in the US, please send a picture and state where you saw/ate it, I'm a bit curious.  Well, I think that pretty much wraps things up, I'll give a final impressions on Hong Kong a little later but for now I think I'm done.  I hope you enjoyed these last few posts and continue reading, after the anime rush, I'll be doing other things so you don't have to worry about giant masses of anime writing for a while after I'm done.  Also, apparently my posts are way longer than I originally intended, expect long posts pretty much always.  Another note, there are a lot of bakeries in Hong Kong so if you like bread, it's a good place.

--CsMiREK

On food in Hong Kong (liquids)

So, you might be sick of me starting posts with the word 'so', maybe not.  You might also be sick of Hong Kong posts, but there is one more yet until the end of my Hong Kong wrap-up.  This post happens to be on the various liquids, their ingredients, and various bottlings and casings they are found in.
First I'll start with the standard stuff, water and tea.  When at a restaurant, it seems very strange when you ask for only water, either ask for lemon water or tea or coke, otherwise you'll get weird looks, this is my advice to you.  Also most places, barring Pizza Hut apparently, serve tea as the standard and not water.  As for water itself...it's water, not much more to say there.  There are many types of teas and a plethora of different beverages in Hong Kong, many I'm either scared to try or just didn't because I didn't have time to try them.
Next I'll talk about something I'm more familiar with, soft drinks.  As an American, I know my way around soft drinks, at least I like to think so.  To that end, I'd like to point out some differences between soft drinks in the US and in Hong Kong.  First off, most soft drinks in the US use sugar substitutes or other sweeteners like high fructose corn syrup to sweeten their drinks.  I'd be remiss to say that no soft drinks in the US are flavored with actual sugar, eg. Jones' Soda, but I would be correct to say that most aren't.  However, in Hong Kong, most drinks are flavored with sugar (see picture below, turn your head I guess).

After the ingredient differences, there are also flavor differences.  For example there is green tea flavored Sprite(see picture below) and Coke Lemon, which may have existed at one point but I no longer see it commercially.

On the topic of green tea Sprite, while I do not like green tea particularly, I also didn't find the green tea Sprite very appealing.  Ha, I probably got you to think I'd say the opposite, you guessed wrong.  Anyways, it was a very interesting drink, and I'm sad that I forgot to quickly get a bottle or two to bring back to the US.  An interesting fact about this green tea Sprite is that it is sweetened with stevia.  If you haven't heard of stevia, I have some articles on it since I was a bit confused when seeing it as well.  They are here.  The effect the stevia had on the green tea Sprite was to have an incredibly powerful sweet taste that left a strange aftertaste, too difficult for my non-chef mind to explain properly.  Also, I'm lazy so I don't feel like thinking back about that very strange taste.  In any case, if it ever comes to the US, which I highly doubt, I suggest you look at the ingredients and maybe try it if you like green tea.
Well, this seems to be quite the long post, but at least I have more pictures for you.  The most visible difference between soft drinks is definitely bottling.  Here I have two examples of strange bottles, one for Mountain Dew, which tastes a bit funky more like Sprite in Hong Kong, and orange Fanta, which tastes largely similar.

I hope you enjoyed this strange post on liquids in Hong Kong and I hope that if you decide to go to Hong Kong that you stay hydrated with funky fluids like these.  Next post is on actual food in Hong Kong.

--CsMiREK

PU1

PU stands for "Personal Update."  You're free to pronounce this as "P-U" like it stinks or as "PU" like poop, your choice.  Now I personally don't really like talking about myself or my current situation very much.  This might be apparent from the lack of actual personal details I've stated so far, but maybe it isn't so clear to everyone.  In any case, I'd like to dedicate this post to my last day in Hong Kong and the crazy circumstances behind it.
Originally, I was supposed to stay in Hong Kong until July 29th, but the weather was bearing down on me and I felt it was time to leave early.  However, I was expecting to have at least a week to walk around, shop a bit, be a tourist.  This did not happen.  Around noon on June 30th, in Hong Kong time, I got a call from my cousin saying that my flight had been changed to later that evening around midnight, again Hong Kong time.  Frantic, I got my stuff together and soon enough we were off.
Since I am, at least ethnically, Chinese I had to go see my deceased grandfather's remains.  Turns out he was cremated and placed in a building that had a few cats roaming (see picture below).

While the tone of this last statement seems really rude, I truthfully had no clue about my grandfather's remains and I had only ever met him once when I was very small and therefore have no memories of him.  Regardless, it was a very powerful and emotional span of time for me.  Those unaware of Chinese customs regarding the dead may learn something from the next few sentences, otherwise I think you know where I'm going now.
First off, I'd like to say that the building and surrounding areas were beautiful (see pictures below).

Chinese customs generally deal with a lot of burning of things to send them to the dead.  For example, you burn incense a lot.  It's hard for me to describe exactly what kind of feeling you get as the smoke from the incense reaches your nose, as you close your eyes and get an indescribable feeling of maybe calm and perhaps remorse from the very particular smell.  It is also a tradition to buy special paper money to burn for the dead to use in the afterlife.  This is burned in pretty much a bonfire, a blazing inferno with a lot of heat and a lot of smoke.  Although my trip to Hong Kong was largely uneventful, it's doubtful I will ever forget those feelings and my thoughts at the time.
Afterward, my cousin, my aunt (father's sister), grandmother, and myself went out to go for food and shopping.  Truthfully, it was getting late and we rushed a lot and much was left unbought but perhaps that is a good thing.  Interesting fact, my last meal in Hong Kong was Pizza Hut, more on that in the post on Hong Kong food about food not liquids.  While I feel sad that I didn't get to sit in Hong Kong as a tourist for long, I'm personally glad to be going back to the United States for reasons somewhat hard to explain.  Look forward to many more posts today and tomorrow as summer 2010 begins and I finish up my Hong Kong wrap-up.  Also, don't expect a lot of personal updates as I'm not that kind of person.  On a last note, for two flights in a row now I've been sitting in a row with 2 people with the middle seat empty also I'm at the window seat.  Also, seeing a 40+ year old man watching Hannah Montana disturbs me, almost as much as me recognizing that what he's watching is Hannah Montana.

--CsMiREK

Spring 2010 Review: Working!!

So, this week is a big ending week for anime in regards to the spring 2010 season.  I just finished the mid review for Giant Killing and am now set to give a review of the comedy slice of life, Working!!  After this, as in within a couple days will be the review for the comedy gag style Arakawa Under the Bridge.
Working!! is a comedy anime that follows a 16 year old guy, Takanashi Sota, and his encounters with a new part time job working at a cafe called Wagnaria.  He is recruited by a small senpai or upperclassman, from here on I will use senpai partially because it is shorter and I am lazy like that, named Taneshima Popura or Poplar, like the tree.  As the anime continues, we meet a host of interesting characters from a waitress that carries a katana and shows lesbian tendencies, nothing major, to a violent, red haired androphobe (one who fears men).  Needless to say, this is a heavily character driven anime that has close to no plot.  However there is plot continuity and should be watched in order as each episode links to the next in some way.
Personally, I really liked this anime.  There was a lot of humor and I found each of the characters and their respective quirks quite likable.  There is no real objectionable content except a couple of strange innuendos that are easy to overlook.  As a comedy anime, there is also a good amount of romance and a bunch of really odd situations.  For example, the main character crossdresses in not one but two episodes.  While I am not into that, the comedic effect of it was quite powerful and fit the plot perfectly.  Along the lines of music, the OP is typical of this type of anime, high energy with a bit of a high pitch voice.  Perhaps a bit better than some of the other OPs in this genre, I personally do not listen to the OP/ED very carefully unless I like them.  As for the actual soundtrack, it is largely unimposing yet a good blend and just plain feels right to the anime which is always a good thing.
Overall, if you are looking for a good laugh, this is a pretty good choice.  If comedy is not your thing but you like embarrassing dramas and love stories, this will fit the bill pretty well.  Otherwise you might want to stay away.  Perhaps this anime is in the world of otaku and not your thing, but it was funny and I am hoping for a second season.  If you watch, you will probably understand why since the end leaves a lot to be explored.  In any case, I am putting this right towards the top of my list of the best of spring 2010 with a few of the other animes not yet reviewed yet.  Next up is Arakawa Under the Bridge, another comedy but completely different in style.  After that the summer 2010 season kicks into full gear so expect first episode reviews.  After that and all other reviews are done, expect more randomness and a storm of strange articles, complete with my own brand of either criticism or disbelief.

Overall: 9/10
Amongst comedy anime: 9/10
*Note: you get pictures too - link
           I found myself too lazy to mash them together so you get that instead

--CsMiREK

Spring 2010 Midterm Review: Giant Killing

So, in a couple of days the summer 2010 anime season will get into action but before that I still have a few reviews to finish.  This post is on the soccer anime Giant Killing.  While I do not usually enjoy or watch sports anime in general, Giant Killing was among my favorite anime of the season.  The basic story is about a failing professional soccer group called East Tokyo United or ETU for short that has been consistently doing badly for past seasons.  To this end they try to employ Takeshi Tatsumi, a former star player of ETU, who has been in England managing a small town's soccer club.  He manages to raise that small town's soccer club to be a formidable team and as such his former team tries to recruit him again as manager/coach to the ailing ETU.  Rife with problems, he comes to ETU and immediately kicks up a storm, changing the major lineup and in doing so, dividing the team.  In this way, the show deals with more than just the team members but also touches on things like the managing and coaching of the team and player to player interaction.
At the end of the 13th episode, the most current episode to date, ETU wins its first game of the season and the show seems to really get itself into gear.  It seems unclear how long this anime will last but it seems to have gotten off to a good start at a good time, in sync with the World Cup.  As a sports anime I have to say that I am impressed as the anime does not have ridiculous players and the main focus is not a single person.  While Tatsumi is a very central character, other characters are fleshed out and explored almost more so than Tatsumi.  I find it a good thing that it can be hard sometimes to tell that Tatsumi is a main character and feel that for this particular anime, this is perfect.  Along with good things there are always bad.  The art is a bit strange and perhaps old school, think triangle noses, and the animation could be better for a sports anime.  The music is often nonexistent or so lacking in strength that it does not add to the power of the individual scenes.  I also did not personally enjoy the OP/ED very much but they were not terrible.  However, if those are what hold you back, that is not really a good reason.
Overall I thought that Giant Killing was a good, strong anime this season and if you like soccer a pretty decent watch.  Next up, probably later today or tomorrow, is the comedy, slice of life anime Working!! followed by Arakawa Under the Bridge.  Durarara!! is being delayed since I have not finished watching it yet.

Overall: 8.5/10
Amongst sports anime: 9/10
*Note: Giant Killing can be streamed legally from crunchyroll.com

--CsMiREK

Weekly Discovery: week 3

So, it's been a month since I started this blog and if I'm correct there are probably only 10 or so people who actually read it.  I would be lying if I said I don't want more people reading but I do realize that the internet is a very, very large place and there is an astronomically low percent chance of this blog ever becoming widespread.  In any case, this particular post is on the next artist of the doujin gothic scene from Japan, Asriel.  Asriel is a duo consisting of Kurose K who is the composer and does some of the backgrounds while Kokomi is the vocalist.  Out of the three I'm talking about, Asriel is likely the most well known due to them having done the OP to the anime Monochrome Factor and the ED to the anime 11eyes.  While this is true, I won't say that they are the best out of the three since that's up to you to choose.  Regardless of that, here's a crossfade from 18 different tracks.

Asriel - xfade

I apologize for the sound quality as some of the tracks were quieter than others, when I tried to amplify some of the tracks I accidentally caused some clipping and caused some problems.  A word of warning, Kokomi's vocals are really strange.  They fit really well with the type of music but tend to be oddly pitched and quite on the really sharp and high side.  That said, enjoy the crossfade and look forward to the last in this group, Rokugen Alice next week.  Also, here is their website: http://asriel.jp/  Next post is a mid anime review of the soccer anime, Giant Killing.

--CsMiREK

Spring 2010 Review: Angel Beats!

Onto the third review of the spring 2010 season, Angel Beats! is an anime produced by Key, the company best known for such anime as Air, Kanon, and Clannad.  However, unlike those titles Angel Beats! is not a romance and is not based off of a game.  The main genre here is actually action if you can believe that.  Along with that we have themes like the afterlife and school life.
A brief synopsis would likely go something like this:  Otonashi Yuzuru wakes up in a strange world and pretty much the first thing he does is die.  He is told that this is a form of afterlife and that the people here are people who died with troubles in their lives.  There's gunfights and magical powers and all sorts of weirdness as Otonashi slowly gets accustomed to this new life and the strange people around him.
While not the most amazing action anime, it's not a terrible anime overall.  There is some pretty decent music, some pretty good animation as you might expect of something produced by Key, and a pretty good plot, if not always apparent.  The characters are interesting and their interactions even more so.  You get a nice and complete ending that also leaves a sense of "huh? there's more?", which I feel is perfect for this anime in particular.  The pace was pretty good, with little dragging and yet not overly squished like Ichiban Ushiro no Daimao.  It might be a bit rough getting through the first couple of episodes due to the "what am I watching" factor, but after that it becomes pretty good so I say it's worth a watch, especially since it was one of the only real action animes of the season.
As stated earlier, the music was decent, there are a couple of interesting vocals throughout but besides that, the music is not particularly memorable, to me at least.  The OP and ED are both pretty good and are probably towards the top end for this season.  As an interesting fact, the break at the middle of the anime plays a concert A, 440Hz or so, as the tone.  Besides that I have one picture from episode 12 that I just had to point out because it reminded me of something.

So, the character in the picture is Yuri, the second character you meet and as you can tell by the gun, this is an action anime.  However, the computers in the background remind me of a much older anime, Serial Experiments Lain.  It's a good anime that is heavily thought provoking, to that end watch at your own discretion.  Angel Beats! is nothing like that, but I felt that I'd like to point it out.  Anyways, Angel Beats! was a pretty decent anime and next up is...Durarara!! I think, I got behind so maybe a different anime will be next.

Overall: 7/10
Amongst Action Anime: 6/10

--CsMiREK

PP, FfT, PoI, or ToI?

So, here's another post because I like getting things off my chest all at once?  Regardless, along with WDs and pointless rantings, I'd like to have some more variety to the types of posts I have and thus I have been pondering the name of the new section.  Do I go with "Personal Points" (PP), "Food for Thought" (FfT), "Points of Interest" (PoI), or "Things of Interest" (ToI)?
I suppose I should give some reasons for each one now.  PP reminds me of pokemon for reasons quite obvious as well as Microsoft PowerPoint, both things are quite good I suppose.  FfT reminds me of Final Fantasy Tactics, a good game to be sure, but also Fast-Fourier Transform of which I do not have fond memories, enough so that I won't even give a link to explain it.  In addition, food for thought is a cheat in the original Starcraft but is often a phrase used much too often.  PoI looks...pretty bad but isn't a bad title as long as I don't shorten it.  ToI reminds me of "Tales of Interest", something seen from the American cartoon, Futurama.  This is a good place to be, however I'm still unsure of which to use.  To that end, I will think it over and if you feel inclined to, leave a comment or email and help me decide or help me come up with something I didn't think of at all.
Anyways, onto the actual post since well...that was just a jumble of words without a real meaning.  As you'll soon find out, I periodically scour through the Yahoo! odd news and some other news sites for really random and enlightening things.  However, for this I'd like to share an article from BBC about grumpiness.  I really hope you clicked the link as the rest of this post relies on it.  No matter whether you think my writing is good or bad, you should know that I am usually on the grumpy end of the spectrum.  For what reason is hard to explain but I feel that this article is a pretty interesting and thought provoking thing.  To all you happy-go-lucky, optimistic, sunny day type people, you're not thinking clearly.  Stop being so happy, it's not useful.  Perhaps that's a bit harsh but personally people who're too happy really...irk me.  Anyways, that's all for this post and look forward to more really strange articles in the future.

--CsMiREK

Spring 2010 Midterm review - Kaicho wa Maid-Sama

Time for the next anime review of spring 2010.  First however I'd like to say that RAINBOW is being removed from my list because I'm too lazy to finish watching it now that it's 26 episodes long.  In its place I will be giving a review of Durarara!!, sometimes shortened to DRRR, from the winter season that is concluding at the end of the spring season.  This review is on Kaicho wa Maid-Sama and is a review of the first 12 episodes out of 26.
Kaicho wa Maid-Sama is a shoujo romance anime centering around the student council president of Seika high school.  When translated, the title is pretty much "The Student Council president is a maid" so I guess that sums up much of the anime's premise.  The main charater, Misaki Ayuzawa, is pretty much your standard tsundere tough girl type character who, in her position, is fighting for the safety and welfare of female students in the predominantly male Seika high school.  She also has a secret side job at a maid cafe which prompts the title.  On the other side is her male counter, Usui Takumi, who remains a mystery and static force of confusion and mixed emotions from Misaki.
While not a breathtaking anime by any means or one with a crazy outlandish set of plot twists or much originality at all really, I still would say that Kaicho wa Maid-Sama is a pretty decent anime, especially in its genre.  Misaki is far from weak, yet constantly shows a softer side in each episode.  The relation and comedy drawn from Usui's particular behavior is also somewhat refreshing, although again far from original.  The romance itself is better than most as well, partially drawing from a good cast of voice actors in relation to the characters.
Regarding music, I would say that it is decent.  Not a marvelous score by any means, but not terrible.  Another interesting thing is the use of classical music, namely Bach, inside the musical score in a light and proper fashion.  I definitely won't be placing this as one of my favorites of the season but it is worth a proper watching I think, especially if you're into the genre.  Next up is the anime  Angel Beats! from Key, the producers of animes like Kanon and Clannad.  Look forward to the review in a couple of days.  Also, as a side note, expect reviews to be longer and more in depth starting summer season since I kinda just jumped into this without thinking about it...like a lot of things.

Overall: 7/10
Amongst Shoujo Romance animes: 8.5/10
*Note:  This anime is up for streaming, but it's not free so...I'm not gonna bother.  You're better off finding subs elsewhere...illegal but free, tough choice ain't it?

--CsMiREK

Weekly Discovery: week 2 pt2

Here is the second post of the day on the group MiddleIsland.  To my understanding they started as a piano group and added vocals along with other instruments later on.  The vocals tend to change from track to track since they, like many other doujin groups barring Asriel, collaborate with each other to make their albums.  That said, the main vocalist has an incredibly "powerful" voice and is pretty distinct, especially in conjunction with the background music.  In addition, they make incredibly heavy use of guitar but also don't shy away from instrumental tracks full of powerful string sound.  While perhaps not rated quite as high as Asriel and Rokugen Alice in my books, they are without a doubt an interesting group that at least deserves a listening.  With that I will give you my crossfade made from 8 different tracks of theirs from multiple albums.  As I'm still getting used to crossfading and all that, it's not all too great, but at least it's longer than the last one.  Next up is likely going to be a mid-anime review of Kaicho wa Maid Sama or some sort of rant.

MiddleIsland-xFade

This is their site with crossfades of most of their albums: http://www.middleisland.net/
Note: While I don't endorse illegal downloading in general since having CDs is nice, these tracks are pretty difficult to find/get so if you want me to "direct" you, send an email or whatnot and I "might" place you in the right direction.

--CsMiREK

Weekly Discovery: week 2 pt1

This week's WD is again a music related one but this time we go from France to Japan, where most of the music related WDs are likely to live.  First however, I'd like to make some changes to my original post season review plan.  Since a few of the shows I am watching have been extended to full 25-26 episode long status or longer, I'll be doing a few more mid-anime reviews.  The anime in question are Giant Killing, K-ON!!, and RAINBOW so look forward to those really soon, most likely next week.  Anyways, back to the WD.

More than tackling a single artist/composer for the next few WDs I'd like to talk about a genre of music that I enjoy a little bit, maybe a bit too much?  This genre happens to be gothic metal/rock.  Now I don't mean to say by any means I'm that kind of person.  The thought of teen guys in all black and jeans much too skinny for them perturbs me greatly goes for teen girls too.  However, when it comes to music, I'm open to many, many things.  While the US has gothic bands, I'm generally not too interested however, some of the music I've found around the internet coming from Japan intrigues me.

In particular, I will be talking about 3 groups MiddleIsland, Asriel, and Rokugen Alice.  I will also be talking about them in order in 3 different posts.  The MiddleIsland post itself comes after this post since I don't like incredibly long posts and this one is more background than anything.  So for background, all 3 groups are labeled as 'doujin' groups.  This means that they are pretty much indie groups in Japan although Asriel has been becoming more mainstream lately with a couple of OP/EDs of anime.  The major events for these types of groups are Comiket held bi-annually in summer and winter, M3 a music convention held bi-annually in spring and fall, and Reiteisai which is a special convention held in the spring for a specific game (Touhou games) and fan-made things including music.  Of these, the most famous is definitely Comiket but I won't go into detail as there are quite a few questionable things to say about it.

Back to the music style, I would call it best as gothic metal/rock or symphonic metal/rock.  All 3 groups make heavy use of various string instruments, pianos, and guitar.  The vocalists are all a bit different, especially when compared to American music standards but that's something you'll find out quickly enough.  So without any more delay, the MiddleIsland post.

--CsMiREK

First Review of Spring 2010: Ichiban Ushiro no Daimao

So, with just a couple weeks until the summer anime season starts, I'm reviewing all the anime I've kept up with this past season.  First up is Ichiban Ushiro no Daimao.  The genre for the anime in question is without a doubt harem.  There are 5 girls yet the anime is surprisingly not romance focused.
Since this is the first review, I will be explaining my setup for all of my reviews.  They will start with an intro stating the genre and some interesting qualities that make the anime stand out, if it does.  Next will be a super brief synopsis with as few spoilers as possible, in case you actually do choose to watch the anime in question.  After that will be a bit about my impressions in relation to other anime and a section on the OP/ED if they're notable.  I will end with a section on music if I thought it was good and give the final overall score in relation to the anime as a whole and in relation to other animes in its genre, at least in my opinion.  If I found any pictures of particular interest, they'll be placed at the end.  With that, I will begin this review for real.
Ichiban Ushiro no Daimao is a harem manga whose main character is Sai Akuto.  He wants to be a priest, or something to that effect and so enrolls in a magic academy in wherever this anime takes place.  He comes to class and is immediately labeled "demon lord" and the entire school erupts into chaos.  Blah blah blah, he meets girl after girl as they somehow fall in love with him and there is a climactic battle at the end of the anime.
While most harem animes end up as trash, eg. Sekirei (manga is better in my opinion), To-Love-Ru (manga is better in my opinion again), along with a whole host of others, Ichiban Ushiro no Daimao does stand out in its genre.  For one, the main character isn't a complete wimp which is always a plus.  On the other hand, I felt that the ending was seriously rushed and that the anime should have deserved a full 24-26 episode term.  The beginning was definitely much better than the end as the anime tried to shove a lot of plot into the last 4 episodes which caused a lot of confusion, at least on my part.  However, there are other pluses, namely the main character gets a kickass dragon in the middle of the anime who he ends up riding into battle with at the end of the anime.  Special note, the three characters that are part of the student council minus the president are totally ripoffs from the anime/manga Princess Resurrection, if you've seen that.
As far as the OP/ED go, they are pretty solid but not great, much like the actual anime.  While not amazing, it's really hard to say that the anime was terrible either so here are my final scores, maybe I will go more in depth next season.  In the end, you could do much much worse although it is important to note that the anime does have a lot of fanservice with panty shots and the sort.  Expect more pictures next season since I just started this and was not expecting to do post season reviews.  Next up is a mid-anime review of Kaicho wa Maid Sama.  Expect it in a few days along with a WD sometime soon before or after.

Overall: 5.5/10
Amongst Harem Animes: 8/10
*Note: You can stream this anime legally from crunchyroll.com (has some weird censoring but it's legal)

--CsMiREK

Double posting, endless ranting

Well, I feel a bit bored, so here's another post.  Given my writing style, it must seem like I like to rant a lot, and I do.  Therefore, it should be quite obvious that I should have posts devoted solely to ranting about pointless things.  Thus my motivation for this post.  So the question to be answered is: "what will I rant about?"  Will it be ranting about ranting as this seems to be...perhaps that might be fun.  Ranting about ranting it is.  As you can tell, I don't think particularly hard while writing these posts, maybe because I like typing exactly what my mind is thinking; I'm not really sure.  So onto ranting about ranting.
My personal belief is that the media likes to rant incessantly about things that while they should be ranting about, are blown quite out of proportions.  I don't understand how people like Glenn Beck, who are pretty much talking balls of ego, become popular and make it on the air.  Even sadder is that the second thing that pops up after typing the letters "gl" into google is Glenn Beck, right after glee apparently.  Now I have listened to Glenn Beck talk and my reaction is that he is really annoying.  Words said strongly are not equivalent to powerful words.  On another, slightly unrelated note, I would like to say that I am pro-choice because well...it's easy to say that you are pro-life when you don't have anything to lose from it.  Since this is a touchy subject to some people I will merely say this: with life comes death.  My thoughts are that those who seriously wish to go through with an abortion will and that this debate is a pointless waste of people's efforts as they push beliefs that are rather trivial in a day to day sense onto others.  Anyways, back to media over-ranting.  I'd like to say that cookie monster has not betrayed his creed and life's work.  However, I'd be lying if I said that I believe that.  Although with a bit of looking around, it's pretty clear that the media definitely blew his eating of vegetables out of proportion.  I am a bit sad about that but this media explosion has proved to be pretty funny.  As long as I know that cookie monster hasn't abandoned himself, I think the generation I'm a part of will be ok.  Anyways, some interesting depictions of cookie monster are good for you, the first two are really unrelated but quite funny:  here, here, here, and here.  I'm happy that cookie monster is trying to teach moderation but am sad from his almost seeming betrayal.  Anyways, I think I've got everything I wanted to say out so I'm done for the day.  Next post is my first spring 2010 review, or it should be at least.

--CsMiREK