Aldnoah.Zero and mecha anime in general

Lambadelta

Lambadelta

Mad Scientist
Jatz said:
I wouldn't be surprised if AZ hasn't sold very well. It looks a sweet set, but the opinions I've heard on the series are really mixed. A quick look on MAL and the top 4 reviews all hover around 5.
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I did the same thing when checking out the box contents I also noticed its got a pretty high price tag on it for what it is, but I guess thats aniplex titles for you.
 
Aldnoah Zero is straight up terrible. There's a great review of the show on Youtube by Demolition D+ that pretty eleoquently explains just how bereft of logic and how badly written it is. It's worth a look (although I believe there's some NSFW language in there.)

It's a sterling example of why I'm so violently opposed to Aniplex's pricing strategies. If you're going to charge the earth and the moon for your shows, it's maybe a good idea to make sure they're not a steaming pile of **** that'll make folks feel angry for spending their money on them.
 
I love AZ. I will freely admit it's daft as can be and will be horrendously disappointing to anyone expecting sensible realism, but it entertained me far more than I was expecting. Watched it streaming and bought the whole thing on BD at full price, with an extra purchase of one of the JP volumes for some extra music (its soundtrack is top tier).

It is (was?) readily available via streaming so blind buying isn't necessary. Which is a very good thing for a marmite show like AZ.

R
 
I really liked Aldnoah Zero. To be honest I couldn't understand why people found the second half confusing as I understood what was going on with the martians.
 
Yeah, I'd also say that calling AZ **** and awful is overstating things. In fact, I think the first season is pretty great, and even the S2 goes off the rails and is a big step down, it's not irredeemably bad as many say.
 
While I hate Aniplex pricing, and for that matter, pricing inconsistencies in general, I really do like the first half of Aldnoah, not the second, despite some plot flaws. If anything I find it confusing why the majority of anime is popular when the pacing of most series seems to be at best pedestrian and at worse non-existent in a modern market filled with moe=profit.

Personal taste and all that jazz.
 
I really enjoyed as well AZ as well as did a friend of mine, It was one of the series from that season that we talked about every single week when we skyped.
 
Lambadelta said:
well I'm looking forward to trying it out from the mystery box,

Hopefully the reviewers on mal are just overly critical
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Honestly, using the MAL reviews at the top of the page isn't the way to go. They're only a tiny minority, and are mostly written out of anger and frustration by people who dislike the series of out of total infatuation by people who like the series. Sure, most of the reviews at the top are 5/10 or whatever, but if you look at the MAL score, which averages out everyone's score, not just those who bothered to write something, and you'll see it's almost at an 8/10, which is much closer to the general consensus than those cherry picked written reviews.
 
IncendiaryLemon said:
Honestly, using the MAL reviews at the top of the page isn't the way to go. They're only a tiny minority, and are mostly written out of anger and frustration by people who dislike the series of out of total infatuation by people who like the series. Sure, most of the reviews at the top are 5/10 or whatever, but if you look at the MAL score, which averages out everyone's score, not just those who bothered to write something, and you'll see it's almost at an 8/10, which is much closer to the general consensus than those cherry picked written reviews.
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Ye I understand that. I only did very light searching since I owned nothing in the box I wanted just a quick idea of what the shows were about, and caught a glipse of the review section.

I generally am not a fan of mecha anime (code geass being an exception), but I'm willing to watch it with an open mindset.
 
I liked the first half of AZ (haven't seen the second half yet)and it's good to see it in the mystery box, since it alone cost me £40. The artbook is nice too, and as for the negative reviews it's ultimately subjective, and the best way to get a feel for a show is to give it a chance and decide it's quality on your own, so having an open mindset is always a good thing:)
 
bailey1985 said:
I really enjoyed as well AZ as well as did a friend of mine, It was one of the series from that season that we talked about every single week when we skyped.
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I'm not usually one to single out a post like this, because I FIRMLY believe that folks should be free to enjoy whatever they want to. And I try REALLY hard not to be a dick about passing comment on this kind of thing. But PLEASE - enjoy Aldnoah Zero if it's doing it for you, by all means. But make a point of watching something better when you're done. The genre has much better shows to offer, like (off the top of my head) Mobile Suit Gundam The 08th MS Team, Eureka Seven, Patlabor, Gundam Unicorn, RahXephon... I could go on.

Also, just by way of a quickie response to Lambadelta's comment about 'generally not being a fan of mecha shows' - really gotta say: I hear that a lot. And it always puzzles me a bit. The mecha genre is actually pretty diverse in scope. I'm often amused when people claim to be turned off by mecha shows but then proclaim great things about shows like Escaflowne or Full Metal Panic. I've even seen Evangelion fans trot this line out, and that makes my head hurt.

I sometimes feel like there's this weird invisible line some folks draw between mecha anime (which they can't be bothered with) and shows they can give time of day to which happen to feature giant robots. There's a ton of good robot shows out there if folks just go looking for 'em.
 
Yea same as above! Every time I see the " not a mecha show fan" comment I die laughing cause if you think about it the root of anime is some kind of mecha!
And yeah I enjoyed AZ although there are far more better classic mecha shows!
 
HdE said:
Also, just by way of a quickie response to Lambadelta's comment about 'generally not being a fan of mecha shows' - really gotta say: I hear that a lot. And it always puzzles me a bit. The mecha genre is actually pretty diverse in scope. I'm often amused when people claim to be turned off by mecha shows but then proclaim great things about shows like Escaflowne or Full Metal Panic. I've even seen Evangelion fans trot this line out, and that makes my head hurt.
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For some reason I also consider myself not being 'a fan of mecha shows'. Not to say that I don't watch mecha shows or that I dislike mechas, it's just that seeing the mecha tag on a show does not sway me either way. I have seen (and enjoyed) quite a few mecha shows over the time, but most of them I enjoyed not primarily for their mecha aspects.

That the mecha genre is quite diverse might also be part of the problem (for me). If a show features magical combat, I have a clear picture of what to expect from the combat scenes. If a show features mecha combat, it could be anything from swordfights, gunfights, large scale military conflicts, space dogfights to magical-esque combat even.
 
LukSkywalker said:
Yea same as above! Every time I see the " not a mecha show fan" comment I die laughing cause if you think about it the root of anime is some kind of mecha!
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It's hard to really explain what essence of a mecha focused show doesn't appeal to me. The only reason I like Code Geass is because of Lelouch, and only Lelouch.

I would guess its the aesthetics, and general storylines that mecha shows tend to portray. I'm not going to sit here, and say I've sat down and tried every large/popular mecha show to see if I liked them. I've always really just kept my distance except for the odd tries of Evengelion, and the likes.

Though the comment that its part of the root of anime I think you can say that about nearly every genre. There is always a bit of everything in the beginning of something, and its splitting off and becoming more specialized is what makes it a separate genre.

I also wouldn't laugh at someones tastes even if its a very broad, and vague claim to dislike they are still the personal tastes to someones entertainment experience, and not everyone has a completely logical reason for disliking something. Sometimes people can by nature just dislike something.


/offtopic

Still hoping for Log Horizon S2 P2/Berserk BR/Chobits BR/Ergo Proxy BR to end up on the MVM sale.
 
Lelouch drove me up the wall in s1, I got on his side in R2 and like him enough for the end to effect me but CC was the main factor I watched it and Suzuaku. Though now with Akito the knightmare fights are my fav bit as more money he gone in to them due to it being theatrical.
And Leila she is pretty cool too.
 
This off topic conversation is now a legitimate thread.

(Also AZ is waaay better than RahXephon!)

I think there are several flavours of mecha, and some short change the characters to focus on the mobile suit battles or dramatic mid-series deaths or political shenanigans. Or at least, that's the stereotype they have. If you value characters highly, that can be a turn-off. It's why I really liked the character art being used to promote AZ on the packaging, because it's more of an action drama with mecha than a hardcore mecha show with the other ingredients thrown in.

I actively like mecha shows but I can see why people might find the genre a bit cold compared to other content. On the flip side, I actively hate 95% of moe shows and don't feel too bad dismissing every 'inept, giggly girls in a school club' out of hand unless there's evidence the show isn't going to annoy me. There's always that 5% or so which manages to appeal to people who normally have no interest in certain content keeping me coming back.

R
 
I never thought I'd get into mecha anime. Now I'm probably one of the bigger fans of the genre on the board.

I like robots, machines and mechanical things in general and that side of things always appealed to me, but I never really liked the idea of child protagonists and combat being a major focus of the show "Shonen Fighting Anime #912, episode 7480" is still something I can't get into. I don't particularly find fights interesting unless they're really, really well done and there are actual stakes.

Patlabor helped ease me into the genre though an actually interesting cast of adult characters and a creative team I knew and trusted (Oshii, Itō and Takada specifically). Unfortunately it did kind of spoil me because it's still the best mecha franchise that exists as of today, imo. Even if you don't think you'd like mecha anime, Patlabor is definitely worth a try because its characters and their interactions are some of the best written in pretty much all anime for my money.

The second franchise that became very dear to me is Gundam's Universal Century timeline. As another classic, it seemed like a logical place to go from Patlabor. I certainly won't deny these shows have their problems, mainly with repeating plots and overuse of the same character archetypes, but taken as a whole it's a grand universe of interesting characters, technology and themes probably at least the equal of Star Wars, if I'm honest. And I say that as a big SW fan. The plot lines run the gamut from goofy to soul-crushing, but partly that's what makes me enjoy it. Because life is like that. The protagonists genuinely surprised me by being a lot more interesting than I expected as well - Yes, sometimes they can be mopey or violent little sh*ts but there's actually nothing wrong with having flawed main characters, it's a lot better than having perfect ones.

While we're discussing the genre in more general terms, something I've felt for a while now is kind of a gap in the market is giant robots that actually posses some kind of artificial intelligence or sentience of their own. You have machines controlled by pilots or bio-mechanical ones which are little more than beasts, but no-one's ever thought to create a show where the robots are at least partially in control of themselves (which is, I think, where warfare in the real world is heading). I don't know if this is maybe a reaction against things like Transformers, the idea that perhaps robots which appear "alive" is more something for kids, but I'd be interested to see the adventures of a self-aware war machine.

Aldnoah Zero is prompting such stark divisions between posters here I'm almost tempted to try it just so I can take sides and have a debate.
 
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