Anime of Spring 2007 -Part 3-

Continuation of Part 2. Most of these were one that I watched on the sidelines while I waited new episodes of other series to air.

Lucky Star

Everyones favorite series of the Spring season it seems. But for the majority of them, they didn’t really grasped its comedic value. They only understood at what was at the surface when the real ‘joke’ was hidden deep within where the knowledgeable anime fans would find it. Where you’ll get a laugh because Konata is attending a concert where Hirano Aya is singing “God knows…” a song is from The Melancholy of Suzumiya Haruhi, the more knowledgeable fans will laugh again because Konata is watching Hirano Aya sing while Konata herself is voice by Hirano Aya! ^_^

But it was still an anime that ANYONE could enjoy, that is, if they are into slice of life comedy where nothing really happens. I guess that was what made some people stop watching it, two of my brothers and my cousins stopped watching it saying something like “It’s boring, is that all they do?” But for the rest of us who like stuff like this, we got treated to a really enjoyable anime with too many references to list and a twin tailed tsundere girl named Kagami!! ^_^

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Kaze no Stigma

I was watching this for the sole reason of hearing Makino Yui’s new role of Lapis Suirei. “Makino Yui has this nice, sweet, and lovely voice when she sings and when playing as Sakura-hime in Tsubasa Chronicles. She breaks off of that voice and goes into a monotonic and emotionless voice to play as Lapis Suirei!! GOOD JOB MAKINO YUI!! ME LIKES!!” ^_^{–source: Open Your Mind}

A good thing was that this anime wasn’t a complete failure. In the beginning it was just about Kazuma and Ayano’s trying to get along with each, but Ayano made it difficult by being an arrogant and irrational person who would go wild if anyone said she likes Kazuma…which she denied of course. This went of for a while, but when Kazuma’s past came to surface and the appearance of Lapis Suirei came, the anime got a tad bit more interesting. But not enough for me to get excited over, in the end it was just an anime to watch while I waited for other anime.

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Kaibutsu Oujo

With the premise of having the Royal children fighting each other to death and only having one standing at the end, which in turn will become Queen/King, this anime was rather boring. There’s a lot of mythical creatures here to make a horror film with a better executed plot, we have a vamipire {Reiri}, a werewolf {Riza}, a demonic princess {Hime}, a tiny and powerful robot {Flandre}, swamp monsters, zombies, and just about any other creature from other monster movie…and oddly enough, no Frankenstein.

It shows promise, but when you add a useless cowardly-like servant who was brought to life so he could be a warrior of the Royal family by Hime’s flame, you get failure. For someone who is half-immortal you would think he would start training so he could protect Hime from all those monsters sent by her siblings to kill her, plus, the name Hiro kinda implies he could be a Hero…right? The only good thing that came out were the sexy Reiri, the strong Riza, the evil looking but nice Hime, and Misato Aki’s single “BLOOD QUEEN”.

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Dennou Coil

This is a really interesting anime with and interesting concept. Let me try to explain it:

Its set in the future year 2026 where Augmented Reality technology is now mainstream. The setting is in a fictional Daikoku City, a hot-spot for Augmented Reality and where city wide AR infrastructure is emerging. With the help of AR visors, users can see the virtual world of the city and even interact with it, as in petting a virtual cat, which a person with out the visor can’t see and would only see the person petting empty space. There are illegal software, virtual pets, and techniques created by Hackers to manipulate virtual space itself. And where there’s hackers, there’s a program to act as a firewall and threat eliminator. Kinda like a virtual police, but it’s a giant red robot calling out “Boku Satchi!”. The anime follows a group a children as they try to unravel the mysteries of the half-real half-virtual Daikoku City, while encountering Satchi and outrunning it.

Well, at least it’s not completely connected to the internet like Mega-Man NT Warrior where you can even hack a stove…A STOVE CONNECTED TO THE INTERNET!?! WTF!? >_<

Dennou Coil is one of those rare anime that appear once in a while with striking art and animation. Not a lot of people will find this anime good enough to hold their interest, but if you like the animation and artistic value of Kamichu!, Dennou Coil will be for you! Dennou Coil is still running its 26 episode life span, with only 3 episode remaining.

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Murder Princess OVA

I really didn’t think I’ll like this anime as much as I thought I would. The concept of having two characters switching bodies never struck it with me, but having a bounty hunter {Falis} and a princess {Alita} switching bodies is awesomeness. Rarely do you see a princess kicking major ass…even though it’s not the ‘real’ princess. ^_^ The complete series is full of ass kicking. I think there was enough material to span a full 12 episode season. They could’ve emphasized the story a bit more by showing Falis’ past and the History of the Kingdom and ancient civilization. But 6 episode was good enough!

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Appeareantly, the next two aren’t from the Spring 2007 season. But they deserve and Honorable Mention!!

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Doujin Work

The name itself would imply that it will be filled with the doujinshi and be heavily centered around it. Oddly though, it rarely had any ‘otaku terms’ or weird thing that one would think happens in doujin circles. It followed the story of Najimi and her entry into the doujinshi world, her motivation…MONEY! That’s all she’s in it for, easy money. But of course, there is no such thing as easy money. She doesn’t know how to draw and it’s hard to compete for sales in the doujin world.

Most of the comedy of Doujin Work is centered around sexual innuendos…which that rape-aficionado innocent-looking hentai girl named Tsuyuri usually starts! She started the misunderstanding of the hotel, making Justice keep an eye on Junichiro, which she told Kaneru was a love battle for Najimi. Now Kaneru is a yaoi fangirl!! ^_^

This is not a groundbreaking series, its something to watch for a fun good laugh and then watch something funnier, like Lucky Star or Seto no Hanayome. It’s a 12 episode series with only 15 minutes of animation…the last 10 minutes are cut off by subbers. I don’t know the exact contents of those ten minutes, but basically its a live-action segment where the seiyuu try to draw a doujinshi and if they fail, they wear embarrassing costumes and apologize to the viewers.

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Nanatsuiro Drops

Nanatsuiro Drops will right away scare off watchers by it’s Mahou Shoujo look and feel. But deep withing the mahou shoujo there is a complicated and really touching love story. You get a feel good feeling watching the cute, shy, and rarely talkative Akihime become very brave and try her hardest at trying to get the Stardrops to get Yuki-kun back to the world of stuffed animals. Little does she know that Yuki-kun is the boy that she admires and has a crush on, Tsuwabuki. And Tsuwabuki can’t even tell her her real identity because if he does, he’ll stay a stuffed animal forever. Gradually, Tsuwabuki falls in love with Akihime and her ‘I’ll try my best’ attitude and eventually start going out. But it’s not all happy feel good time for these two.

I don’t want to give too much away, but Akihime gets emotionally hurt a lot and eventually decides do her best and help Tsuwabuki. And her reward is another painful stage she must go through, having Tsuwabuki completely forget about her…

The story was great and the animation and character designs by Noizi Ito were a definite plus!! One of the best H-Game adaptation in my opinion.

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