Air

Genre: Drama
Age Appropriate: Any Age
Emotional Response: Depressing
Notable Features: Dreams, mental health issues, dancing puppet
Language: English
Length: 12 episodes
Overall Recommendation: Nope

"I had another dream last night." - Misuzu

Air begins with a young, vagrant man looking for food and attempting to use his puppet show to earn some money. Mostly, he's rejected because his show just isn't that exciting. After wandering some, he takes a quick nap on the rock wall of a beach, and wakes up to a strange girl standing in the breeze. Her presence triggers a memory from his mother, and he ends up following her  as the story of the series.

Misuzu takes Yukito home with her, with a promise of food, and ends up keeping him around - despite his arguments that she shouldn't trust random strangers. He ends up staying with her, and her aunt, in t he shed and finds a job in their small town, helping around the office at the local clinic. The story is somewhat split up by two episode mini-dramas, each following a different character. While Yukito participates in each story, for the most part the people in town don't seem to have much of a personal connection with each other. In the end, each mini-drama adds a small piece to the end result.

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I really enjoyed the theme music for this series. It was pretty, and often triggered an emotional response. Unfortunately, that was pretty much the only thing I liked about the series. I can't say it wasn't well done, in some respects, but it was so slow. I think I liked episode 8. I've been through plenty of stories that are sad, melancholy, depressing...etc, but there is always a little something here or there to help me through the pain.

I don't expect, or want, happy endings and cheery stories every time I watch a new series, but I also don't want to force myself to watch something because there is no relief from the oppressive sadness. I've had Air on my list to watch for weeks, and it kept getting pushed aside for something more bearable. The writing was fine, the music was nice, the art was normal, but I just couldn't handle it in any constructive way. I'd be willing for someone to disagree with me, I suppose, and I won't argue that it's "bad," as much as not worth the effort. I just don't think it should've taken me over three weeks to force myself to finish. The final episode did strike a chord with me, but I would've survived without seeing this. Not recommended.

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Um: Uta No Prince Sama

Haganai

Genre: Comedy
Age Appropriate: Teens
Emotional Response: LOL, feel good
Notable Features: high school, social ineptitude
Language: Japanese
Length: 2 season, 26 episodes
Overall Recommendation: Definitely

"Poopy crappy hag!" - Sister Maria

A geek, perverted scientist, dirty blonde thug, and a prima donna girly-girl walk into a common room...and The Neighbors Club is formed. Kodaka is a young man in high school who has transfered in as a Sophomore. His dirty blonde hair, and stern features have created rumors around school that he is a hardened thug, with various exploits under his belt. The other students hide in fear from him, and take every situation out of context. The beginning of his friend-less salvation starts with stumbling onto Yozora, a social outcast girl, who has an imaginary "air" friend named Tomo. After a conversation about their mutual inability to make friends, Yozora creates the Neighbors Club, putting a subliminal-type message on the flyer. The point of the club is to practice being "normal" and making friends for later.

As the flyer is seen by other stranger teens, the most popular girl in school pops up, with great drama, wanting to learn how to make friends. Apparently, her issue is being so popular that no one actually wants to like her. The pervy scientist is a girl Kodaka saves from a faint, and a young man joins the club after deciding that Kodaka's reputation means he's awesome. Yozora, being the evil prankster that she is, convinces Yukimori (said young man) that in order to be more manly, and therefore closer to Kodaka's example, he must learn to brazen his manliness out through counter-intuitive actions - basically, she convinces his to dress in drag for the entire series. The club advisor, Sister Maria, is a super-genius Sister who didn't really know what she was going into, and her arch-nemesis ends up being Kodaka's younger sister who is obsessed with a vampire anime character. Haganai follows a variety of interesting situations that occur as a result of their misguided activities for being more friend-friendly, and the interactions between the group's various frenemies.

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Haganai was a feel-good, funny series that really lifted my spirits a little bit. I'm glad that I decided to give it a try. After watching the first two episodes in English, I was disappointed to find that it was seriously only the first two episodes that had been dubbed. It was funny enough to keep moving, though. The series was fully of awkward characters, and in that way it reminded me of when I was around that age. I don't think I specifically identified with any of them, but the feel was just right. The series itself didn't seem to have any major developments, or conflicts, which may make this review portion a bit boring, I suppose. It was pretty much solely focused on character development. So many high school series have odd attachments to them, and this was straight-up comedy without magic, androids, or gratuitous nudity.

There were a few great LOL moments. There is one scene where the group is on a roller coaster ride that made me cry with laughter. It was in season 2, though, so you'll just have to wait to get there. There was some incidental fan service, but after High School DxD it was practically childish. I have so many favorite characteristics for each character, but I think I really enjoyed the middle schoolers the best, probably followed closely by the cross-dressing cross-dresser. I'm not sure it's really up to a re-watch status, but I would definitely recommend it for someone looking for an easy laugh.

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NEXT!: Air

High School DxD

Genre: Fantasy/Comedy
Age Appropriate: Adult
Emotional Response: Hilarious and Exciting
Notable Features: high schoolers, demons, angels, high nudity
Language: Japanese
Length: 12 episodes
Overall Recommendation: Totally (but only if you like that sort of thing :D )

"Ahh...I wanna squeeze some boobs." - Issei

Issei is a young, perverted high school boy, obsessed with breasts. After entering a school that was previously a all-female institution, his two naughty friends and Issei find themselves surrounded by beautiful girls, but are blocked by their own sleazy personalities. When Issei is suddenly approached by an unknown young lady, asking to be his girlfriend, he can do no other than accept. Somehow, after a lovely high school date, his new friend Yuma is turned into a fallen angel! So begins Issei's involvement in a three battle between angels, fallen angels and devils. Issei grabbed a flyer that summoned Rias, the president of the Occult Club, who saves him from a mortal blow and she brings him back to life as a devil. He's now a servant of her house. In this series, Issei has to battle with his own high school hormones, his new powers as a devil, and the bad guy fallen angels and other devil houses.

After becoming a devil, Issei becomes friends with the rest of the Occult Club - a front for Rias' devil servants within the school. The members are a variety of female types with different personalities, and Issei enjoys them all. There is one other male in the group, the most popular pretty boy in school, who earns Issei's resentment for his popularity, but also earns his respect in battle together. Each member is representative of chess pieces in their abilities - Queen (Akeno), who has magical abilities, Knight (Yuto), who has amazing sword skills, Rook (Kaneka) with super strength and defense, and Pawn (Issei) who has virtually no chess-like powers but can "promote" in enemy territory. Near the beginning there is a new addition - Bishop (Asia). Asia is a former Sister, who is saved by Issei from a terrible battle between fallen angels, a stray exorcist and the team. She joins the team with Twilight Healing - the ability to heal even devils. With their team complete, the group is set up to battle anything thrown at them.

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Let me get this out of the way first - omg fan service. There is a lot of gratuitous breast appearances in this series. This is not the same as Girls Bravo, where everything was just

incidental nudity. This is pretty obvious. If that is something that you can't handle, just skip it. Otherwise, this series is great.

I really needed something comedic this week. I definitely got what I wanted. I knew it would be funny and after the first episode, I knew it was going to be full of nudity. What I didn't expect was to be so emotionally involved. After the first few episodes, it feels like they threw in the fan service because it was expected, not because it was a focal point. After seeing past that, the story is pretty excellent. I was cheering for Issei the whole time. It was at least in part cheering for the underdog. His abilities are pretty abysmal compared to his compatriots, but his enthusiasm seems to make up for some of it. The last few episodes I was clapping along, and at one point a little sniffly. Really, I loved it. I might scoot this up to at least the Top 10 (which now needs to exist). I really was surprised at how much I loved it. I know I enjoyed Heaven's Lost Property, but I didn't inhale it the way I did this.
Highly Recommended. I might even watch it again in the future. I cannot wait until Season 2 comes out later this year. I'm super excited to see where the story goes.

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Boost!: Haganai

Time of Eve

Genre: Sci-Fi
Age Appropriate: Any Age
Emotional Response: Huh
Notable Features: androids, human conditions
Language: Japanese
Length: 6 episodes
Overall Recommendation: Not for me

"Just follow the rule." - Nagi

Time of Eve centers around a high school age boy living in a futuristic world where humanoid-androids are house servents and workers as a normal part of everyday society. The news talks about different issues in the background of episodes and often hits on social aspects per episode. One of the major themes is the relationship between humans and androids, both negative and positive. Those humans moving toward the side of androids being considered more human are even called android-holics.

Rikuo, the main protagonist, follows his android one day, after discovering an interesting anomoly in her travel log. He, and his friend, Masaki, find themselves inside a coffee house where the rule is no discrimination between humans and androids. While in the outside world androids have rings floating above their heads to signify their status, inside the cafe no one has any identifiers. The boys find the whole process very controversial, and find themselves learning more each time they arrive.
Each character finds a different path in their understanding of android/human, human/human, and android/android relationships.

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Time of Eve feels like a mix of AI and I, Robot. Partially because of the human characteristics given to androids, and partially because of the result of those characteristics. It was a truly intriguing series, but I'm also glad it was short. I found myself struggling to watch multiple episodes in a row. I think, perhaps I would've been more likely to watch this for someone else. I don't think I would've chosen to continue it for my own personal interest in a regular situation. Or, maybe I just wasn't in the mood for it. I can think of a few of my friends, who are more sociologically inclined, that would really enjoy the commentary present about the human condition combined with technological morality issues. It was done really well, but it just wasn't my particular cup of tea (pun not intended, but why not?). I guess, the only disappointing thing that I found, in general, is that the ending was a little lame, but I should've expect much out of a 6 episode series.

Given the brevity of the series, it's a pretty short review. If you liked AI and I, Robot - or any similar movie/series - then I would definitely recommend this. If you didn't really care about them, then I wouldn't recommend it.

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Order Up!: High School DxD

One Week Only!

No, really. 

When I first started, I was devouring anime like kettle chips (I like kettle chips, haha). As I started to open up my genres I realized that I couldn't keep up that schedule. In an attempt to control myself, I decided on only posting twice per week. Do you know that posting twice a week can get a little ridiculous? Apparently, according to my friends, I've been unusual in my multiple postings per week. So, I'm going to give once per week a try. I know, for sure, that this will at least allow me to see 2 season series in a healthier pace. If this will make you cry (figuratively or literally), leave a comment I guess. 

Please look forward to Time Of Eve on Thursday. Posts will be on Thursdays each week. 

Thanks! 
Mini-Geek Girl