General anime thoughts/discussion thread.

Lawrence said:
What a big girl. Did he even consider who the intended audience is?
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Actually, I think his biggest objection was to the characters creating an 'attack plan' for a game being played out in their school. For what it's worth, I do think he's failing to consider that the show was (presumably) never conceived of with an American audience in mind, but not being an American, nor having grown up with their gun culture, I don't feel qualified to tell him his reaction is the wrong one.
 
Random question,

I was looking at buying the Dirty Pair TV series but remembered that earlier this year they re-released it, apart from the old release having a booklet with it (containing line art etc) is there any difference, ie is the newer has one better quality?
 
I've not seen the newer release first hand, but I'd guess probably not. If it were a new master or anything, I feel like Nozomi would make a bigger deal of it (especially as it's not been that long since the earlier release), but they don't make any mention on their website.

Edit: Ah, confirmed as no.
 
That's what I thought, but then I was thinking 'Well, why re-release it if you can still buy the original sets from retailers?"

Thankyou! Not so keen on the litebox, now I know what one looks like, so will be getting the older one :)
 
Biggest letdown of my streaming season so far... Genshiken Nidaime.

I was so looking forward to this, but all it's turned out to be is rotten girls and crossdressing. I'm sitting there with a bemused look on my face for most of the episodes, all of my favourite characters aren't in it anymore, except as cameos to try and tempt back the original fans. I keep getting an urge to watch the first cour again and remind me why I loved the show in the first place. Remember when it used to be about geeks?

At least I don't have to worry about buying it.
 
Just Passing Through said:
Biggest letdown of my streaming season so far... Genshiken Nidaime.

I was so looking forward to this, but all it's turned out to be is rotten girls and crossdressing. I'm sitting there with a bemused look on my face for most of the episodes, all of my favourite characters aren't in it anymore, except as cameos to try and tempt back the original fans. I keep getting an urge to watch the first cour again and remind me why I loved the show in the first place. Remember when it used to be about geeks?

At least I don't have to worry about buying it.
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YES! I feel exactly the same way. They spend far more time fiddling around with changing their clothes and creating drama out of nothing than doing anything worthwhile with their hobbies. I also feel that the cast suddenly seems like a bunch of naiive high schoolers instead of the college-age students they're meant to be.

I love rotten girls and cross-dressing but this 'beginner's guide' to the hobbies just winds me up. The first Genshiken made me wish I was in a proper anime club; the new series makes me glad I'm not.

R
 
Rui said:
YES! I feel exactly the same way. They spend far more time fiddling around with changing their clothes and creating drama out of nothing than doing anything worthwhile with their hobbies. I also feel that the cast suddenly seems like a bunch of naiive high schoolers instead of the college-age students they're meant to be.

I love rotten girls and cross-dressing but this 'beginner's guide' to the hobbies just winds me up. The first Genshiken made me wish I was in a proper anime club; the new series makes me glad I'm not.

R
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In terms of representing the fan community, they had the balance just right with the second cour, when they introduced Ogiue and her passions. There was the initial mind-blown responses from the established members, but Ogiue's presence actually worked to tie the club together more. I didn't like the second cour as much as the first because of the presence of Kuchiki, but the characters felt more comfortable in their skins, certainly Saki felt more at the heart of the club, instead of being on the outside looking in because of Ogiue. I haven't felt any of that level of character study from the new series as yet.
 
Personally I'm enjoying it, but having followed the scanlations for a while when the manga started up again, I've had much longer to reconcile the fact that the series is somewhat different to how it was before.

Rui said:
They spend far more time fiddling around with changing their clothes and creating drama out of nothing than doing anything worthwhile with their hobbies. I also feel that the cast suddenly seems like a bunch of naiive high schoolers instead of the college-age students they're meant to be.
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Having experienced a number of different anime clubs over the years, I'd say this is pretty true to life.
 
I'm not convinced having pirated the manga would have helped me. I have been reading the volumes as they come out via Kodansha so I've had a good year to get used to the idea of the new characters, and they still seem flat and weak compared to the original guys. It's also really hard to take any of them seriously; Tanaka's glow at making an outfit or Madarame's thrill when new books appear were much easier to relate to than watching everyone arguing over Hato's no-longer-quite-as-interesting gender issues and continuously dressing up.

Yoshitake has the best taste but she acts like she's 12 years old all the time, and there are plenty of other series out there with that kind of character already.

Even the gags feel flat to me. The one-liner about swimming doujinshi an episode or two ago seemed sort of thrown-in without any real thought ^^;

This is sounding awfully similar to my complaints about Oreimo s2 now I think about it... Sorry about the exasperation, I think the last episode was a little too much. I want more otaku in my Genshiken - and less melodrama.

R
 
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I don't know if I'd say I'm disappointed with Nidaime as I really didn't like the 2nd cour of the original series. I thought the first cour was very funny and felt like a good representation of geek/otaku. Everyone had their interests, they weren't made out to be "cool" geeks, but weren't made to feel like pathetic losers either. They were just a normal group who shared some passions and were friends. They had this little group of their own where they could just be themselves. The 2nd cour sacrificed a lot of the comedy for big drama, imo. Oguie was kind of the reason for that I felt, so I was never overly keen on her. I had initial reservations with this new series being basically an entire female cast, seemed like a ploy to just pander to the male audience and say "here's some cute geek girls." I don't like that Hato is seemingly the main character, she seems to go through the same things over and over, I think we get it by now.
 
Ogiue grew on me, though I've been liking her less in Nidaime since she's been so serious and toned down her original personality quite drastically. It's as though she's only there as a plot device these days (strangely Oono seems to have gone the opposite way and become an even-spunkier self-parody).

20thCenturyBoy said:
I had initial reservations with this new series being basically an entire female cast, seemed like a ploy to just pander to the male audience and say "here's some cute geek girls." I don't like that Hato is seemingly the main character, she seems to go through the same things over and over, I think we get it by now.
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The pandering is the worst part for me. They're forcing Hato down our throats so heavily that it just makes me want to run away.

I also find some of the things the girls do downright bizarre, like how they don't seem to know what they're talking about or have any experience doing anything or any strong preferences*. They come off as a lot more ignorant and shallow than the original male fans, which annoys me. In the first series, Sasahara was the newcomer but everyone else was an established fan which gave the club a proper atmosphere of its own.

R

(*
Hato has a huge collection of wigs etc and professional-grade BL art skills, but has never been to Ikebukuro or a sokubaikai or so much as noticed that Comiket has corporate booths? Why does Angela spend all that time and money travelling to Japan exclusively for Comiket each time only to ignore the event and let Sue buy her books for her? If it's for cosplay, why doesn't anyone take any interest in any other cosplay events? Why do they all read the exact same doujinshi as one another, anyway (other than Hato who seems to have wider taste)?

When the guys in the first season popped over to Toranoana I felt a sense of familiarity about it all, whereas the girls have more in common with me yet at the same time, less, and none of them seems all that interested in what they do when they could be bothering the flustered moeblob Hato instead.
It feels so awkward that if I was told the manga creator had secretly changed between 'seasons' I'd believe it.)
 
Hah, it never occurred to me that there would be a separate Japanese theme tune for that. I don't think it's as successful as the one for Ulysses 31 though.

 
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At the time, it seemed far more ambitious and sophisticated than anything else on kids tv, but how it would hold up now, I'm not so sure. The closest thing I could liken it to in anime terms would actually be Nadia - it's got a very similar classic adventure serial kind of vibe to it.

I'm a little mystified by the decision to bring it back for a new series as well. Much as I understand the nostalgia value, the original series tied everything up pretty definitively at the end, so trying to graft a sequel onto it after this length of time (as opposed to just straight-up remaking the original) just strikes me as unnecessary.
 
My older sister always used to mention the series to me (alongside M.A.S.K. and Ulysses), since it was TV while she was growing up. If it ever shows up on Netflix again I might give it a go.
 
I've been thinking, we know that ADV is not completely dead (as seen with Elfen Lied just recently) and I noticed that RahXephon was recently discussed on Fandom Post. They were basically saying that the show been recently added to Hulu (US streaming service). Since the only licensor the show has is ADV, what if the show is the next title to be released for Blu-ray and DVD? It's possible since Japan has a BD-Box for a while now and it has the English dub (for TV episodes and Movie only, not the OVA). Just a general thought I had.
 
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