Legend of the Legendary Heroes
[starrater]
[starrater]
[starrater]
Dragon Ball Z: Battle of Gods
ドラゴンボールZ:神と神
Toei Animation
Dir. Masahiro Hosoda (
Wri. Yusuke Watanabe
Music by Norihito Sumitomo
SUMMARY
Birus, the God of Destruction, learns of the defeat of the galactic overlord Frieza at the hands of Goku. Seeking an opponent worthy of his power, Birus, along with his companion Uis, travels to the North Quadrant of the universe to challenge Goku to a battle.
PROS
+ The hand drawn bits are gorgeous, crisp, and colorful. During these scenes, DBZ has never looked so good.
+ Birus is funny and charismatic. Fits right into the universe. A good villain.
+ Some of the comedy was truly funny.
CONS
– Facile and meaningless “storytelling,” if you can call it that. The only plot device used was a simple set-up/pay-off that did little more than project the film toward its anti-climactic conclusion.
– No sense of threat or stakes. No one is in any “danger” until the “villain” is refused the chance to eat some pudding. Then, he threatens to destroy the world. SPOILERS: No one dies or even gets hurt, except for Videl, who is hit by a stray bullet and immediately healed by Dende.
– An estimated 50% of the film is wasted on character fan service. Almost every character gets a moment to “shine,” or at least gets a name drop. Characters act completely out-of-character, even Shenlon the Eternal Dragon. The creators know you know them, so they want to give you something new. “Wouldn’t it be crazy if Vegeta sang and danced?” “What if Piccolo sang karaoke?”
– Awful CGI. Conceptually great action scenes are sabotaged by poorly blended and rendered CGI backgrounds and elements.
– New Super Saiyan God form is underwhelming.
– Most of the film only works if you are familiar with the source material.
– Power levels are uneven and illogical. SS3 Goku can’t lay a hand on Birus, but SS Vegeta can when he’s defending Bulma’s honor.
– Feels too long. Made me wish this was another hour-long DBZ movie of days gone by.
1.5 Dragon Balls out of 5.
[starrater]
Plot: Set in 2046 (in the same world as Sword Art Online) the world has been revolutionized by neurolinkers. A technology which almost everyone gets at birth placed around the wearer’s neck. By linking directly to the nervous system it has connected people as computers to the world around them via cell phone networks making online games and connections highly influential to real life. Here we meet the protagonist: Haruyuki. A short, fat, overly bullied and under-ly confident middle school student who often withdraws into the digital universe due to his ability to retreat from real life problems and excel at digital games. His proficiency draws the attention of Kuroyukihime, who is a student council member and the most popular girl in school. She has chosen him for a gift, a program known as Brain Burst in which people in different areas and prefectures battle each other as Burst Linkers to gain levels, the highest -and Kuroyukihime’s goal – being level 10. However, to reach level 10 you must defeat other level 9 opponents, losing one match uninstalls the program. Haryuyuki agrees on the onset to help Kuroyukihime reach the illustrious level 10, but as he becomes more involved in the digital world of Brain Burst black and white begins to gray as people aren’t what they seem, and new enemies lurk just around the corner.
Length: 24 episodes
Original Release: April 6th 2012
Staff: As mentioned in the plot summary the story takes place in the same world as a similar, popular, series: Sword Art Online. This is because both series share the original creator Reki Kawahara. Accel World is based off a series of light novels which are currently at 13 installments and still going. Because of this a second season is, of course, entirely possible (though not absolutely necessary based on the shows ending).
The director, Masakazu Obara, only has one other major directing credit which is Mi-Hime, given the action nature of that show and a “monster of the week” flair I can see how some things translated over to the burst linker fights we saw in Accel World. Even that may be a stretch and there are thankfully not too many other similarities between the two shows.
The music was done by Hiroyuki Oshima and I actually give this man props as this is literally is composer debut and the music was very well done. There was a large range to the show and because of that every type of scene was punctuated with good music. Not technically astounding music, but better than your run of the mill.
Animation-wise the show does not disappoint. The action sequences during the Brain Burst fights are engaging and well done. Two notes for this could be Studio Sunrise’s hand in the animation, as well as a man named Nobutaka Ike being one of the two main art directors. Ike has worked on other projects such as Tokyo Godfathers, Paprika, and Millenium Actress as the Art Director. The styling of the animation is also wonderful, however, I question some choices with regards to Haruyuki’s design.
Main Review: Accel World is a show that I really, really, wanted to blow me away. When I first started watching it I was completely sold. The characters were engaging and interesting, Haruyuki was dynamic and felt like he had a depth to him that I enjoyed – even if his character design was a little disjointed feeling.
It starts off in about a 6-episode getting to know the world and characters type of arc. The world has a depth and complexity to it while still having a number of quirks that make it feel very very real. As a result you’re hungry for more during these first episodes and there are more questions as you begin to learn more about Brain Burst and start to question people’s real motives.
Through episode 12 or so the show really continues to deliver on this. The battles are catchy, even if from time to time shonen cliche, and there’s even some romance, however superficial it felt to me.
However, around episode 13 and on the show really began to drag. Characters began to make decisions on a habitual basis that I kept wanting to punch them in the face for and that initial annoyance with Haruyuki that could be overlooked due to the magic of everything else began to creep up again. To me it felt like the show lost some of its focus on what it really wanted to do and introduced a new villain rather than delivering on earlier promises – such as achieving level 10 and meeting the creator. Granted, this can be as a result of the fact that the source material is still ongoing and they didn’t want to make any major closures but it did feel more than a little disappointing for the viewer. But, I do go back to giving the creators props that the villain in the second half was fantastic, a perfect example of a “love to hate” villain.
Not to harp on art but I think Haruyuki’s design as a strange chibi character was a wedge right from the start that kept getting deeper for me throughout the series. I get that he is meant to be fat, ugly, and from the “lower” rung of the social ladder but I feel like the chibi design showed a lack of commitment to this. It was almost like despite those things he was still cute, which put him in stark contrast to the depth he received from being that social outcast. I would’ve much preferred to see him in a similar style to all the other characters but still have all those other traits. And for the record, I’m not the only one! Men in Japan voted him the second most aggravating character from recent anime.
Either way, the show started out very strong and then lost itself somewhere along the way in the second half. There were things that remained good such as character growth and a big twist… But, there were also a lot of over-used plot devices, poor pacing, and just all around aggravation over the main point of conflict surrounding the villain. It involves blackmail and you just keep feeling like it drags on for no good reason.
In sum, the show could’ve been great, but ended up feeling very lackluster because it lost almost all of the great momentum it had gained on the onset. It’s almost even more disappointing this way and you really want to ream it, but the show did have a lot of strong points, and a few carried all the way through. In an effort to not let my personal let-downs with the show cloud my judgement I felt a 3.5 was a fair score. It was more than I expected from a shonen show, but didn’t live up to all it could’ve been.
[starrater]
[starrater]
[starrater]
[starrater]
Alternate Titles: Dream Eater Merry
Original Japanese Release Date: 2011
Episode Length/Run-time: 13 Episodes
Summary:
Fujiwara, a stereotypical good-hearted yet slightly oblivious high school boy, possesses the ability to see people’s “Dream-auras,” a colored haze surrounding a person which indicates the type of dream which they will have. One day he meets Merry, a dream demon who is looking for a way to get home. They end up teaming up as Merry enters his daydream and saves him from his own dream demon who was seeking to possess his body and enter into the human world. The effort to return Merry home soon becomes locked in struggle against the dream demon Engi, who seeks to destroy others.
Review:
Dream Eater Merry is based off a manga which began back in 2008. It currently has 6 volumes and is still ongoing. As a result the series suffers heavily from two main things. One, operating from a story that has yet to reach a conclusion and likely won’t for some time (like a FMA versus Brotherhood situation). And Two, as a byproduct of one, being far too short.
This anime is one that could have easily been great.
The animation alone is a notch above the rest, even among modern animation standards. Everything flows smoothly and fight sequences are animated flawlessly. But high-gloss colors and quality movement is a dime-a-dozen now a days. What really takes Yumekui Merry above and beyond is the camera angels. Shot like a high-quality cinematic film the angle for the images is used in both artistic and creative ways. The style of art is a cross between dream-like and surreal. Painting an astounding picture of each original dreamscape.
What further improves the atmosphere is the music. Dreamlike, whimsical, and sometimes haunting the music of this show is fantastic. A perfect example of how you don’t need a full blasting orchestra to create fitting and evoking music.
So right now, this anime is at a 5/5. Unfortunately, it was doomed to failure from the beginning.
The anime, as mentioned before, is only 13 episodes long. This is not nearly long enough for this series. The first arc focuses on establishing Merry and Fujiwara’s relationship and overcoming his demons. Now about one third of the way through the series the focus shifts to returning Merry back to the dreamland. In comes a slew of interesting characters and dream demons, a number of battles, and a thickening plot. Each character begins to get fleshed out with decent back story and elaboration on the important parts. Some more would’ve been nice and had it been longer we would’ve had the chance, but we didn’t. Then around episodes 9 and 10 the creators went “oh shit, we have to finish this” and employed an arc that wasn’t even in the original manga. As a result the story seems to jump from this careful development phase to a thrown together ending which feels forced and awkward, despite answering the necessary questions.
The premise of the story is cool, really cool, this connection between dreams and reality. But the fact is they execute it poorly. They don’t have nearly enough time to both set up this elaborate world, flush out the characters, and unravel the plot before the ending is upon the series. As a result, it’s just about average.
Alternate Titles: Queen’s Blade 2 : The Evil Eye
Original Japanese Release Date: September 24th, 2009
Episode Length/Run-time: 12 Episodes
Summary:
It’s time for another sexy battle tournament! Which fighter will become the new queen!
Review:
Wow. I wanted this anime to be a hentai so bad…and yet…it wasn’t. I think I’ll just leave you with that sentiment for a moment…
Ok then. Queen’s blade is about a battle tournament to be the new queen. It’s a single round elimination tournament in which only women participate. Of course! Who wants to see a man’s boobs…wait what? The fights are randomly summoned to battle and the winner of the old tournament get to challenge the old queen for her title. Of course shes not going to make it easy. The queen is a badass, and it’s nice too. 🙂
What else can I say? I mean every fight there are boobs. In some scenes you’ll get some curious tentacles moving about. If you want an anime with no story that is just hot (in some cases, very hot) girls fighting each other. This is just the anime for you!
Alternate Titles: S.Cry.Ed
Original Japanese Release Date: 2001
Episode Length/Run-time: 26 Episodes
Summary:
Due to a strange environmental phenomena an area of Japan has broken off from the mainland and during this humans are given the ability to use Alter, a power which allows them to combine metal alloys to their skin and use magic like powers. The area in which this phenomena occurred is known as “The Lost Ground.” Kazuma is one such native alter user and lives as a mercenary in The Lost Ground. One day a group known as HOLY is dispatched to collect native alter users and Kazuma must defend his freedom against them.
Review:
Shown on Toonami a bit this anime is likely one which many people are familiar with. What’s nice about this anime is it actually has some kind of plot, unlike many anime that are being put out today. Don’t be fooled by it seemingly have themes of uprisings, oppression, and liberation. Those are there, but they’re really not too flushed out or not as much as you want them to be.
The first problem are the characters. They’re either unlovable. Or they’re just silly, for example a character who fight with watermelons. Beyond that the characters get out of hand to almost a Dragon Ball Z scale where they just get overpowered and just go around fighting and blowing things up. This goes with as the series shifts from the oppression to just combat and the rivalries, loosing a lot of the plot along the way.
So while the plot is interesting there are a lot of other things that drag it down making it just average, which isn’t as good as it could be.
[starrater]