Spring Anime Preview 2010

It’s been a while since I actually posted something. I’ve been pretty busy with reorganizing myself and finding a temporary source of income. With distractions being thrown at me here and there, it just makes blogging more of a hassle for me right now since I’m also just catching up on current season of anime along with other shows like Ef – A Tale of Memories, Ef – A Tale of Melodies, Candy Boy, Halo Legends and Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu (2009).

This season seems to be more packed compared to last season preview so I’ll only cover the shows that stand out for me. Some of you may have noticed a number of ‘western’ comics (namely Marvel) attempting to establish a foothold in the Japanese market and possibly mixing cultures/traditions. This has been slowly increasing ever since Halo: Legends was announced and released (possibly even beforehand). My hunch tells me more adaptions of western comics and creations will slowly follow the same fate. This may not necessarily be a good or a bad thing however it will be interesting to see how each series they attempt to ‘convert’ turns out. I doubt it could go rock bottom like certain Hollywood adaptations  (such as Dragonball Z), but I’m sure people are pretty keen to see if the end result delivers awesome results and meet the fan’s expectations. Even if it doesn’t people will probably still go see it whether it is to satisfy their curiosity or just for kicks or laughs.

The highlights for me for this Spring are:

Black Rock Shooter OVA

Thoughts/Observations: I’ve always liked the original art of Black Rock Shooter and I’m glad they are staying true to the original art as it makes the series unique. I have no idea what the back story of Black Rock Shooter so I’m interested on how they setup up each of the main character’s stories. Some familiar faces aside from Black Rock Shooter are Dead Master who I noticed resembles or may even be the same person with Black Rock Shooter’s human form in school. Seeing the Black Rock Shooter cannon fire in the trailer was pretty satisfying,  however I’m hoping it can make a bigger booms than the one in the trailer. It’s a short OVA so chances are I will be watching this one as everything shown in the trailer looks too damn good to miss.

Ironman

Thoughts/Observations: My first thoughts that came to mind was “Don’t fuck up the story and voices like they did in Halo: Legends”, I’m mean it wasn’t all that bad but it good have been a lot better. The art seen in the trailer didn’t really look that fantastic, it even reminds me of those midday after-school cartoons I used to watch when I was a kid. After seeing the Ironman movie, seeing those moving parts on his suit moving about didn’t really have much of an impact on me. Maybe I’m down right butchering the series but I’ll still watch it hoping it can convince to me think otherwise.

Aside from the negative points, the story looks alright, you have your typical villain with minions and all kinds of weapons and gadgets. Like I said before, if they screw up the voice then there’s pretty much nothing else for me to hope for in this series, however will watch for kicks and to see how it turns out when released.

K-ON!!

Thoughts/Observations: Although there is no official trailer out yet, I thought it might make sense if I added the concert in episode 14 just to fill in the video slot. Those who loved K-ON! will keep wanting more, and hopefully K-ON!! (Yes that’s the official name of season two) will deliver like it did in season one. There was much hate on the internet with the excessive moe blob in anime series such as this, so if you are one of those types of people, you’ll probably want to keep far away from season two or probably the whole series.

Actually, now that I think about it, they probably don’t even need a trailer to preview season two. We can expect the gang will graduate from school and enter university whether they might all go tho the same one no one knows yet. We can expect them to  continue their creation and love for music with a more performances, more shimapan, more moe, more ‘Gitah’, more Azunyan, more delicious pickled eyebrows cakes from Mugi, pretty much more of what we had in season one but bigger and better. Season two will begin airing in April this year which isn’t very far off so be prepared…

Angel Beats

Thoughts/Observations: With everyone having high expectations from Key and Visual Arts, there is pretty much no room for error for their next installment, Angel Beats. From the looks of the trailer, Aniplex has clearly  maintained the standards in the visual department and with Key Sound Label in play the audio department the soundtracks should be as fantastic as their previous series they helped create. Lia is once again doing the opening song for Angel Beats, which I can’t wait for. Her voice for Clannad – After Story ‘s opening theme was perfect in every way that it leaves me no choice but to yearn for more hoping my urges will be satisfied when I hear the opening song for Angel Beats.

If you’ve seen Key’s and Visual Art’s previous works whether it be visual novel or anime series, you pretty much should know what to expect in their storyline. If not (I recommend you start as they are truly masterpieces) you can expect a touch of magic, slice of life, lovable characters, family (may or may not be literal), friendship, romance as well as their notable tear-jerking moments that they are well-known for. With that said, I’ll definitely be watching Angel Beats (being the Key/Visual Art’s fanboy I am) and if it turns out to meet my expectations I’ll forgive them for delaying the ever so Little Busters anime which a lot of people are dying for…including myself.

The storyline seems to make the essence of magic more existent seen in the trailer. We are shown a display of magical powers, an afterlife world or realm, unknown enemies possibly even God himself . Unlike Key’s previous work, the theme of magic was much more subtle. Assuming Jun Maeda knows what he is doing (which he probably does as he was in charge of the storyline department for Key’s previous works) the chances of success looks high for this series and I’m not just saying that cause I’m a Key/Visual Art’s fanboy. Anyhow it’s a definite watch for me, lets see if Key and Visual Arts can milk my tears from me once again.

Heroman

Thoughts/Observations: Here we have another example of western marvel culture trying to break the barrier and set foot onto Japanese territory. Even though it doesn’t seen very promising I’m interested in how they got Stan Lee to work on this project , it just boggles my mind. If you read earlier, you would may already know that Ironman is being released in the same season as Heroman which in my opinion should be more than enough spoonfuls of western culture in this season. With Ironman looking average, Heroman looks just looks terrible, I mean…a robot with the American flag painted over it? I feel that’s a pretty big insult to Stan Lee and Marvel’s Captain America.