Attack on Titan

Genre: Action/Drama
Age Appropriate: Teen+ (a bit gruesome)
Emotional Response: Noooooooooo!
Notable Features: creepy pseudo-human looking evil titans, humans
Language: Japanese
Length: 25 episodes
Overall Recommendation: Definitely

"I'm a human being!" - Eren

Eren Yeager watched as a large, creepy Titan picked up his mother and ate her. The Titans have been the enemy of humankind for over 100 years, and they've managed a minutely peaceful existence by building huge walls with cities around the gates. After nearly 100 years, a new Colossal Titan has torn down Wall Maria and opened the way for a new wave. With the town destroyed, the few remaining survivors run to Wall Rose and hope to find some safety there. It only lasts a little while, and the Titans have advanced to a new level, breaching a new wall.

Together with his friends, Eren swears to defeat and kill the Titans to avenge the deaths around him. He joins the recruits for the military teams, and enters 3 years of training, hoping to join the Scout squads in ventures out into the unsafe zones. He makes more friends, and loses more friends, in his quest to find answers about himself, the Titans and how to save what is left of humankind when all is said and done. Each step of the way, there are huge complications with the characters and a staggering death toll in soldiers and civilians. Eren & Co. might be their only hope. There are new variants of Titans, something very odd is happening to Eren's body and every soldier's life hangs on his ability to fly through the trees (almost like Spiderman).

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This isn't in my Top 10, like SAO, but it's up there with emotional craziness. Actually, I think Attack on Titan is a much harder story on one's emotions. There is so much more tragedy and pain involved. There was some hope and normality to save people's sanity in SAO, and there is none of that in this anime. I had a hard time consuming it quickly, and the people I watched it with were pretty gung-ho about the whole thing. It's really well done, and I agree that it's excellent story-wise, but it was brutal and bloody. One friend likened it to Game of Thrones in that regard and I don't think he was wrong about that.

I highly recommend it to anyone who wouldn't for-sure hate it - basically someone only looking for fluffly stuff. This has no fluffy stuff or much humor. Most of the humor is fairly dark - and half of it is probably around the potato-loving character, Sasha. My only other recommendations is to avoid pushing yourself, and don't watch it right before bedtime. The Titans are this odd mix of blank, stumbling, ginormous baby, sexless, mindless people eating machines and it seems that the smallest ones are probably 5 meters tall. It's disturbing. The best part? Eren closing the door slowing on a bad guy (human bad guy). Heh.

Also, by the end of the season I had a crush on Captain Levi. Go figure.

Side Note: If you can find the special chibi episodes, they are totally worth it! Heehee.

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Disturbing in a different way: Loveless

So, I Can't Play H?

Genre: Comedy
Age Appropriate: Older teen+
Emotional Response: Amused and mildly interested
Notable Features: grim reapers, pervs, fan service
Language: Japanese
Length: 12 episodes
Overall Recommendation: Okay

"The size of your breasts isn't important. It's the warmth generated by what's behind them." - Ryosuke

So, I Can't Play H! is all about the perviness. Ryosuke is a young man in high school known for his unabashed love for the female body. He has one great friend, Mina, who loves him despite his awkward inability to keep his thoughts to himself. Even though he's a huge pervert, he also has a good heart and would never do anything (aside from his bizarre commentary) to ever hurt a girl. The whole things goes to hell when he meets a woman outside of his house, who wants him for his energy.

Lisara is a young woman who has come to Earth in search of a person with awesome soul powers that she can use for herself. Until she finds that person, she needs a temporary contract for power with someone, and Ryosuke was the most immediate person when she was in need. Now she's a bit stuck with him until she meets her goal. The story is all about his new found acceptance of how awesome him perviness, his perverted powers that put Lisara above the others and their budding friendships.

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So, I Can't Play H? was a simple series about a pseudo-demonic girl who stumbles on a perv boy and decides to use him for her benefit and ends up in more hot water than she was anticipating. Much like most harem anime, there is a lot of fan services everywhere but slightly better with conveniently placed smoke/steam/beams of light. There were some pretty funny moments, and I didn't hate it or anything, but I would only call it okay.

I never really cared too much about the characters. It was a pretty standard plot line for any harem anime and I didn't see anything special. The only different thing was the almost unique way they tried to spin the main characters perviness. I would say that it couldn't quite pull it off, especially when considering Heaven's Lost Property. So, it was okay. ::shrug::

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CHOMP: Attack on Titan

Diabolik Lovers

Genre: Horror 
Age Appropriate: Older Teens+
Emotional Response: confused fascination? 
Notable Features: vampires, reverse harem, evil
Language: Japanese
Length: 12 episodes
Overall Recommendation: Pretty good (kinda)

"I wanted to punish you." - Kanato

Diabolik Lovers follow a young lady who has somehow been misled into a mansion full of vampires. Her understanding and reality are very far apart. Despite the varied levels of attractiveness and fascination with each of the male characters, each has one thing in common. These are not the nice vampires that are popular today. Yui spends some part of each episode attempting to learn each of the vampire brothers but it seems as though all of her efforts end in futility. Each of the vampires also have something specific to their personalities outside of their clearly different appearance. They all seems to have some sort of horrific personality twist that is often seen in reverse harem anime, but twisted in some way. The series works through Yui's attempted, scary relationships with each and discovering where she really fits into the scheme of things.

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I have no idea how I feel about this anime. On the one hand, I generally like reverse harem anime. On top of that, I've been a vampire freak for most of my life. One would think that between the anime geekiness, vampire geekiness and reverse harem geekiness, this would be perfect for me and yet I'm left somewhat confused and unsatisfied. It completely reminds me of Amnesia, in that way. Actually, it reminds me of Amnesia in a lot of ways. Both of them seem to have this quiet horrifying experience wrapped up in them, but also a weird fascinating quality that makes me want to finish them regardless. I think that's why I don't know what to feel here. I couldn't decide if I to kill them all, or hope they ended better than they began.

Of course, that also puts me in a conflicted position about how to rate this anime. I've put down "pretty good" because that's true. Whatever else I might be feeling, I have to admit that I certainly feel something, and that is usually a good mark of an effective story. So, it was certainly well done. I just don't know how to recommend this to someone. I guess, if you're into that kinda thing, this is a pretty good series. I know that I'm certainly interested. I also still retain my vampiric enjoyment (especially since none of these guys sparkle, ew). So, yeah I would recommend it - just to very specific people.

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What just happened?: So, I Can't Play H?