HNNNNNNGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG!

Having watched previous seasons of Mahoro and Hidamari, I knew what they were going to be about. Black☆rock Shooter? Not so much. Actually, I don’t particularly enjoy Vocaloid stuff so I never paid much attention to the BRS song. After hearing about its anime announcement I found the character design intriguing and the song was actually starting to grow on me.

So I decided to take a look at what Blackrock Shooter actually was.

BRS was originally an illustration by Huke. Vocaloid user Supercell/ryo then followed up with a vocaloid song. It was such a hit that GoodSmile Company even made a PVC figure of.. I DON’T EVEN KNOW HER NAME. Does she even have a name yet? Anyways, the anime looks visually stunning, check out the sreencaps courtesy of Danny Choo.

Is anyone worried that this anime is just based on a drawing/video and nothing more? or are you all just as excited as I am?

When the episode began, and I saw their awesome getup I knew this was going to be good.

This episode sets up, quite nicely, the making of the SOS Brigade’s Movie for the school festival. More importantly, this is the arc after Kyo Ani’s Endless Eight. So what do we get after eight episodes of the same events? The basics. We get what made Haruhi great in the first place. Her expressions, her randomness, her continuous verbal abuse and lack of respect for any of her club members.

KyoAni and Shaft need to gattai. It would be interesting if Kyon and Senjougahara ever met, considering how rebellious Kyon can be at times and Senjougahara’s crazy personality.

Prepare yourself for a Haruhi facial expression montage!

For some reason I keep seeing Yui’s face in the two caps above.

Note the eyebrows

Not really a facial expression. More of a Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann pose.

Her “I am unamused” look

Her “oh my, did I just reset the world?” look

I LOL’d. Reminds me of Grand Kaiser’s Goddess Hands from Yakitatte! Japan.

I like her feigned innocence look!

She’s been doing the eyebrow thing alot this episode!

OOH! I like this one!!

and not a second later she can be all smiles

Again with the eyebrows!

This one is cute~

Annnd that’’s it. Looking forward to the rest of Sigh.

Something I noticed was that usually the episode title would have I, II, III etc if they are a multi episode arc. Endless Eight, however, never had them. Perhaps the eight episodes will really be treated as one episode? That ay we can get Sigh and Disappearance this season!

… well one can always dream right?

hey I was there!

I really liked how the first episode went. We were introduced to Mirai, who has problems I could realte to. I mean she’s in a normal family, that’s slightly dysfunctional, yet everything seems to hold together. That’s how she sees it anyways. Sure, her husband is a total asshole for forgetting his wife’s birthday, but lets ignore that for now. Aside from her parents occasionally bickering, shes also appointed what seems to be an endless list of house chores. If you ahve parents that both work all the time, and you are the oldest in the family, I’m sure you could imagine exactly how Mirai was feeling.

I especially enjoyed the emotes throughout the entire episode…

…like her >_> face!

or her :> smile …

did I mention the shifty eyes already???

Anyway, TM8.0 looks quite promising, I’ve got it up there right behind Bakemonogatari (STAPLER!!!).

OH NOEZ Yuuki!!!!!!!

Yeah we all know he lives, I don’t even know why they bothered with the cliffhanger… -_-

My weaboo Saturday afternoon = time well spent.

Lets walk through the OP together. I think what turns alot of people off is the romanized typography:

But after a dozen or so watches, I think it fits pretty well (or I just got used to it). It actually reminds me of the really old Batman & Robin TV  series where when they punch people, these big comical “POW”s and “WHACK”s and “THUMP”s appear on the screen. Now that I think about it, the first 30 seconds of this OP reminds me of American Comics.

But if you can just make it through the first 30 seconds, this is where the OP really starts getting good for me.

One of my favourite scenes in the OP is this running sequence, where all the members appear, in the order they joined the SOS Dan too!

And this shrug. WHY IS IT SO CATCHY? Does it mean anything? When it come to Haruhi, you know KyoAni’s gonna go through everything with a super fine comb.

And my second favourite scene from the whole OP:

I should make a desktop out of this. In fact, that’s what I’m going to do right now.

Super Driver OP ddl via [Insanity Sings]
Super Driver OP YouTube

ps. Yes I know. Aya still can’t sing. Its ok.

While Nagisa’s Yui’s words pretty much described my feelings for the first episode of K-ON! I mean the episode was great, I enjoyed the gags and the moe blobs, but it wasn’t anying amazing. But Mio,for me, stole the  show. Yes, its quite obvious that she already huge fan favourite of many, and the ED solidifies this fact.

That aside, is it just me or does Tsumugi remind me of Momoha from Manabi Stright? Maybe it is just me.

The Op itself was also not bad, abit happy-go-lucky for me, but addictive nonetheless:

But its the ED I wanted to talk about! First of all, I can’t KyoAni-fanboy more than I am now. Its just not humanly possible! It was very reminiscent of a typical Japanese music video. I’ve heard some complaints of it being out of place and such, but if you think about it, a music video is absolutely perfect fit for an ED. Its what (the popular) bands do right? Also, the facial expressions, the details, its amazing. /fanboying
But seriously, I can watch the video and just be drawn in by their facial expressions when they sing.

Oh and did Kyo-Ani just use Minami-ke’s patented \o/ and :< mouth combo?!?

And of course, the beautiful K-ON ED.

According to Gigazine’s website the “renewed” airing of The Melancholy Of Haruhi Suuzumiya anime series is 28 episodes long. Gigazine said that they had contacted the Teletama broadcasting station and a representative had reportedly told them that “we hear from the client that it is 28 episodes long.” J-Cast had also contacted Teletama upon hearing the news and they were told that the “renewed” airing will also include new material due to the planned 28 episode allotment. Interesting…

So, everyone.. tell me what you think KyoAni will do with 28 eps of Haruhi?

CCY > 25 MINUTES OF HARE HARE YUKAI
Ci > They (will) air it in normal order, THEN THE AIR IT BACKWARDS, THEN HAVE ENTIRE EPISODES DEDICATED TO SHUFFLING THE DANCE.
Shin_Asuka > they animate the entire series with figmas in stop motion
Shance> the next Haruhi will have flags … for routes … and then hscenes … nuff said

As for me? You know that episode dedicated to Nagato sitting on the chair reading a book? Yeah 16 episodes of that.
This is cokematic, reporting live from #dasku @ irc.rizon.net , Chiriririririririririririri!

The current ranks are purely based on hype, PVs and promo material (from most anticipated to least):

Eden of the East – Umino Chika’s designs are nostalgic and the Morita clone random naked guy makes things all the more interesting
Full Metal Alchemist – after watching the original anime, I didn’t find out until much much later that it deviated from the manga (which I never read). Very interested to see what direction this will take.
K-on – kyoani fanboyiism. A God Knows every episode is fine, too.
Valkyria Chronicles – Haven’t played the game yet (its on my “to play” list, right behind Star Ocean 4) but definitely looking forward to it. However, RPG -> Anime adaptations usally don’t meet my expectations.
Hayate no Gotoku II – I was slightly taken aback (maybe even worried) that JC Staff took this off SynergySP, but if the ova is any indication, it should be just as fun as the first season.
Basquash – I originally did not intend to watch this since I hate basketball, but the designs have me a tad curious. This is a total wildcard, could end up being top 3 or bottom 3 on the list at the end of the season.
Shangri-la – gonzo. Probably should be in the wildcard slot, but that’s being too hopeful.
Hatsukoi Limited – being low on the list now may not be as bad as it seems. It is kind of hard for me to get overly excited about a JC Staff-generic-harem-anime. But hey, doesn’t mean it can’t be good.
Saki – The PVs have lowered my expectations considerably due to the seemingly over personification of mah jong. Chances are there its not going to be the next Hikaru no Go, but probably not as bad as say, Shion no Ou.

That’s not to say I think shows that are lower on the list will be bad, since I at least planned to watch it, just I’m not as excited to watch the show.

Yayoi is sitting on the left side suggesting she’s driving on the right side of the road


Eiji is sitting on the right side suggesting he’s driving on the left side of the road

someone care to explain?

Other notes:

1. Watching the first episode of Maria+Holic with the Super Famicom Voice Module (+CCY) podcast was an interesting experience. I tried watching along with them and let me just say that if it wasn’t my second time watching the first episode, I definitely would of gone insane. There are times when they just go off on a complete tangent and trying to follow 4 people talking AND the show itself was just damn near impossible. They had so much to talk about during hte episode, but after it ended the discussion kinda went south. And I wish they would just shut up abit during the text intensive parts of the episode :P But overall it was a fun experience.

2. I think everyone has seen the “Matsurika Hero” gifs already, I just wish it was animated a bit better so I could make a wallpaper out of it >.< Btw, Maria jumping on ladders = awesome. (and I like the second GIF more, the one without a pause)

3. I watched the OP 6+ times today. And I really loved Koda’s unconventional “karaoke” of the OP, it fits too damn well (Someone get her a job at SHAFT).

Maria+Holic OP / HANAJI

and this Phoneix Wright/SZS parody is pure win.