Otakuism

The next batch of what I think of all the new fall shows. Included this time is the cute and vaguely supernatural Asatte no Houkou, the entertaining (up to vol. 7) Death Note, and an interesting announcement of a new anime production based off another, you guessed it, visual novel. Well technically it’s a kinetic novel but no one’s keeping track.

Shouko Nogami

Karada Iokawa

The siblings Touko and Tetsuya Amino

Starting is Asette no Houkou, a slower, softer show that hints at later romantic melodrama. This being from our good friends at J.C. Staff I know they can pull that off very well. A brief rundown of the story: It begins with Shouko Nogami just moving to a quaint seaside town and happening to meet our lolicious heroine Karada Iokawa, who is making a wish at a local shrine. Shouko joins her in making a wish. However more links are two heroines then a simple wish. You see Shouko dated Hiro Iokawa, the brother of Karada, who left Shouko four years ago since his parents died and he needed to take care of his sister. Of course Hiro never even told Shouko he had a sister, leaving her bitter all this time. Along with this trio is our two side characters, the brother and sister pair of Tetsuyo Amino and Touko Amino respectively. Tetsuyo is a classmate of Hiro’s and and seems to have (creepy) feelings for Karada. Touko is just incredibly spunky and hot. Nothing wrong there. So the selling point of this anime is at the end of the episode, where Karada and Shouko switch places (kind of). You see Karada wishes to be older and Shouko wants to start over, which means being a child I guess. It’s more like their bodies change instead of their minds, so it’s unique there. Next episode looks to up the ante when Hiro discovers the switch.

(Hawt) Adult Karada

Loli Shouko

Animation wise J.C. Staff has gone more low key this time. There’s none of the stunning animation like Shana or Zero, instead a muted watercolor look, like a mixture betweeen Honey & Clover and Muteki Kanban Musume (weird combination I know). Character designs are definately cute, especially for the girls. Adult Karada is definately “hot damn look at that!”, while loli Shouko still looks like a cynical loser. Only thing off is Hiro, who’s hair covers his entire face 95% of the time, making him look like a creepy h-game protaginast. Also I hate the Op and Ed. Generally I don’t like those that focus on one character over the rest, namely Karada here. I mean Shouko only in the Op for one frame and the entire Ed is just Karada running. No good. I’ll still be following this to see where this convulated love triangle goes.

Originally Death Note wasn’t on my watching radar. I had already read the manga and at least enjoyed the first half, and most straight adaptations get boring after awhile. Seeing as Death Note’s a lot of talk that really get’s to be too much, not complex just over-redundant. I don’t need to hear Light second-guess L for the millionth time. However I must say this adaptation has completely blown me away. Madhouse has taken Death Note and completely runaway with it, arguably making a better story in the process. First the cinematogrophy is stunning, with the mixture between the Light’s gray and rainy world and the sun shining just on him looks beautiful. A lot of the overtly classical christian art also works great, really showing off Light as God. Love how beautifully rendered Light’s eye’s look when he’s thinking up something mad.

Two scenes that absolutely stood out to me: First, Ryuk’s appearance to Light. Here did I truly see Ryuk as an evil being from the grave in all his distorted glory. Second was the awesome sequence of Light writing down all the names. The music was flat out awesome, and the quick cuts between Light writing and the criminals dying was brilliant. That’s how you make a show about talk exciting. Also loved how much Light flourished when he wrote. Only insane people do that. Only dissapointment I have right now is the voice acting. Tamaki as Light really isn’t workin’ out. He just can’t do the necessary insane laugh. He sounds alright till Light needs to start sounding like a messed up genuis, and then it doesn’t work. I thought Ryuk sounded a little too old and grumpy man like, but it works better than Light’s voice. He’ll probably grow into the role. As long as Death Note is able to keep this level of entertainment I’ll definately be watching.

Finally in a bit of unrelated news, ANS says that the kinetic novel Shinkyoku Soukai Polyphonica has been cleared for an anime series, probably for 2007. You may remember that Insani released the demo of Polyphonica this summer, which I played and greatly enjoyed it (mostly on the excellent character designs). I’ve been hoping of seeing more of this game and it seems my prayers are answered. I was hoping more for something like a Hirameki license, but this we’ll do. Apparently it’s a kinetic novel, which means no choices (think Planetarian) so maybe we’ll get a straightforward game adaptation.