UlasanAnime.com – As the Summer 2011 anime season gets underway, it’s time for a rundown of the titles that have caught my attention. It’s remarkable how much anime I can still manage to watch given my usual schedule, and writing about it helps me process and move on to the next thing.
The Idolmaster is finally here, and I’m ready. At least, my body is ready, as they say.
Visually, Mawaru Penguindrum stands out as the season’s winner. While I’m blogging about it elsewhere, I hope it will also inspire me to write more about it here.
In terms of mood, I’m particularly drawn to Kamisama no Memochou and Kamisama Dolls. The latter evokes a strange urge to sing “UNINSTALL,” while the former offers a DRRR-esque vibe with its eccentric NEET characters. Both shows are wildcards in terms of their execution and plot development.
A seemingly safer bet is Blood-C. While Blood+ had its flaws, Blood-C has the potential to revitalize the brand by retaining its attractive elements and discarding what didn’t work from its predecessors. However, each reimagining seems to chip away at the original concept. This will also be my first Nico experiment, targeting a high-profile show with good viewership numbers, hoping for insightful comments to outweigh the less intelligent ones.
Twin Angel is another Nico experiment, but in reverse. It truly highlights what people mean when they talk about watching subpar anime on Nico that they wouldn’t have otherwise.
I felt similarly about R-15. It’s a creative kind of “crap anime” that is enticing enough to keep me watching, even without the Nico snipping. While it might be a typical harem show, its deviations from the norm make it amusing and somewhat thought-provoking.
That’s far more praise than I can offer for shows like Black Rabbit. I feel a “Kuroneko” sentiment towards this anime, seeing it as a pathetic chuunibyou attempt to capitalize on a trend using unoriginal source material. That might be too harsh, but at least in Yumekui Merry, there was a moe factor and a sharp sense of direction, neither of which are present here. And why am I criticizing Yumekui Merry? Obviously, Index is the true public enemy number one.
Dantalian at least looks passably decent. The Nico comments do help it a bit, similar to Blood-C, but I’m not particularly excited.
Nekogami Yaoyorozu is… Touhou anime. Too bad it’s not even funny.
The real dark horse of this season is Ikoku Meiro no Croisée. It’s poised to be culturally relevant and iyashikei with an overwhelming amount of moe. It’s a “Jasc show” in every sense, and it has a significant advantage because no one is criticizing it; everyone is too busy dissecting Usagi Drop. Grrr.
On a side note, isn’t it ironic that just over a year ago, Funimation had a partnership with Fuji TV for noitaminA? Look at the situation now – zero shows!
I believe Number 6 will find its audience. The drama, presented in the noitaminA format, should be compelling as long as it has substance. It can’t be worse than Jyuohsei, and I actually watched that. Oh, the hardship.
The true guilty pleasure of this season is undoubtedly Ro-Kyu-Bu. I’m watching it for the seiyuu marketing, that’s it. More seriously, if it can stick to its three-episode premise about team building and standard sports drama tropes, I don’t see how it could turn out badly, unless you count the FBI shutting things down as a bad ending.
Speaking of those three-episode pilots, I thought R-15 episode 2 was superior to episode 1 in every way. It felt like watching two different shows. Ro-Kyu-Bu also had a similar disparity, but that was more because the plot didn’t fully kick in until episode 2. What’s going on there?
Then again, some shows are still sticking to the formula. I’m not sure what to make of Sacred Seven. I’ll probably pass on it until I catch up on Blue Exorcist, or something equally unlikely. It’s not bad, just not good enough.
However, sometimes “not good enough” is acceptable, especially if it’s the only thing airing on CR on a Monday (man, I miss Kaminomi) that I can watch on the go via 3G streaming. YuruYuri fits that bill.
I kind of wish that were true for Mayoi Chiki as well. As it stands, it might not matter – if I can’t get to episode 2 by the time episode 4 airs, the odds are slim that I’ll ever watch it.
Is that all? Probably not. I have a couple more shows I want to try, like Manyuu!. I’m still watching a lot of shows from last season, which cuts into the new ones I can pick up. And then there are returning series like Bakatest. Oh well.
The net total is pretty good; we’re talking about only two shows that I find even remotely notable that aren’t getting a simulcast. Even Morita-san wa Mukuchi has one. Now we can argue about 1-hour, 24-hour, 72-hour, or 144-hour delays, or whether we can even call it a simulcast (I don’t think we should), but in my book, any of those options are better than never.
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