With the gentle urging of a fellow Hitohira fan I finally decided to go and watch the anime. I prefer the manga but the anime is a wonderful adaptation. Hitohira is the story of a painfully shy girl who after being roped into joining one of the two competing drama clubs learns to be more confident and peruse her dreams. The anime captures all the powerful moments of the manga with the added force of voice acting for any of the scenes where they play is taking place. I enjoyed the manga a little more because I feel it was a tighter story. Everything happens pretty much the same they just take more time to do it in the anime. Also Mugi Asai seems less hopeless when we spend less time with her running away from her problems. I was glad to see a bit of resolution to things that were only coming to a peak in volume three of the manga, which is the last volume of the manga that has been released in English. The anime has a good stopping point but I know that the manga continues the story. I wish that we could finish the manga in the US but I am not holding my breath until that happens.

I have been happily watching the new Saint Seiya OVA, Lost Canvas. Though our main characters Tenma (don’t mistake him for Seiya, as this story takes place 250 prior to the original series) and Alone are new, many others are  familiar faces but now that I really think about it, they could just look familiar as Tenma does. I know that Gold Saint Aries Shion is the same, but it’s all a little fuzzy. In any case, there is little introduction which makes this OVA rather inaccessible for anyone looking for a point to get into the series. Being that I am already a fan, this phases me not and rather I am enjoying seeing who pops up when. The story is really a sad one of how best friends find themselves on very opposite sides as Tenma is destined to be a Saint and Alone is to be the vessel for the revival of Hades. The episodes revolve around this revival and Hades’ army trying to destroy anything that comes in their path. Through episode 4 the focus was on Tenma and his training, realization, and then we are left on a cliffhanger as he along with Yato and Yuzuriha are in Hell searching. Episodes 5 and 6 we completely switch over to the Sanctuary and a long battle showcasing Pisces Albafica which seemed a bit out of the blue. However, it looks like the coming episodes are back to the main story at hand.

I have been meaning to watch the Dirty Pair TV for a while now. I have always been a fan of the show from what I have seen of it. I know over the years I have watched random episodes in a wide variety of places. The Dirty Pair TV is just as fun as the OAVs. The formula is as always very simple. Kei and Yuri are troubleshooters for an intergalactic trouble shooting organization. They can solve any case but always with a tremendous amount of collateral damage. If you are looking for deep philosophy and personal growth in the Dirty Pair then you are watching the wrong show. The show is just fun and excitement with a tasteful dollop of sexy on top. Kei and Yuri have a nice banter between them like any good buddy cop series. They might always be fighting but you also always see a strong bond between them. Episodes are fun to either marathon or just watch one at a time. Next up for me are the Dirty Pair movies.

The more volumes of Dragon Eye I complete the more my heart sinks knowing that more than likely it will never actually be completed in Japan. Volume 8 is mostly fighting in the tournament that is still ongoing. There are two really intense and wonderfully choreographed battles involving Hibiki in which he shows his many strengths and also a cold determination to make it through. Of course all of these things just add up to him being a really great and quite unreadable character at times. Also a reluctant Issa performs another amazing feat battling against a spell caster. He boasts at the beginning “5 minutes” but it is certainly a good 5 minutes. As seen before, Issa cares little about authority and much more about his squad but is put in his place much to his chargin during this tournament. Though some of the cliff-hangers from the last volume are wrapped up, the actual plot only comes to ahead right at the last moment.

A Certain Scientific Railgun is a fun little action show but my goodness does it have that totally blatantly silly yuri fanservice that anime have been in love with lately. They took one of the most popular charaters from Toaru Majutsu no Index, Mikoto Misaka, and spun her off into her own series. I being a big weirdo actually liked Touma and Index but I can’t say I have any objection to watching a show about Mikoto. It is set in Academy City, that is a city mostly made of schools with students with psychic powers. It seems to be introducing to Mikoto and her friends. We have Kuroko aggressive lesbian roommate, Kuroko’s “police partner” Ruiko, and their mutual friend Ruiko who has no powers. We are shown how the girls meet in flashbacks alongside the cases that they get involved with as two of them are part of the organization Judgment, that polices people with powers. So far the show has had a mostly light and breezy air of fun but the end of episode 6 after the credits shows that might not be the case for long. Kuroko straddles the line between being funny and disturbing but other than that it is a fun little show. I wonder if there is going to be a larger overall story having to do with the frequently mentioned database of students. Are we slowly building up to this story or are they just going to use it to cap off the show?

There are so many great Saints to choose from, but Shion is special this week:

I also read NISIOISIN’s Zaregoto in an attempt to see what had perplexed Narutaki so. My summation of the book is best left to “Weird Al” Yankovic, Everything you know is wrong! Because that is the total summation of the ending of this book. Ii-chan solves the case and the survivors leave the island. Then in the epilogue we learn that everything that was answered was absolutely incorrect. It’s not Ii-chan who figures it out though. Some psycho detective pops up and gives us all the true answers in a clearly deus ex machina manner. I’m not sure if I like this book or not. It was definitely odd plus the storytelling and the characters are very, very strange. I think it supposed to be vaguely unsettling and disorienting. I can’t quite but my finger on whether it made the story uniquely enjoyable or just strange for the sake of being strange.

Watched Saint Seiya episodes 7-18, finished the first arc and have gotten just a couple of episodes into the next one. Here is what I have learned so far: no one dies, for any reason, unless they really want them to; they are fond of saying “Hell” or “I’ll send you to Hell!”; they love to punch people in the heart, like through the skin and into the heart (though people still don’t always die of this); they are not unaware of their female fan-base as proven by the Shun in the shower scene; and finally huge bad guys can still be scared away the police. Oh and I love it. This isn’t my first viewing of Saint Seiya, but I have never really sat down and watched consistently.

After reading Black Lagoon volume one I have to say I enjoy the anime slightly more than the manga but that is of no disservice to the manga. The manga is quite excellent. But seeing the awesomeness that is the Black Lagoon manga in it’s full color kinetic glory when it is animated is way better. I don’t mind buying them both but if asked to choose I would pick the anime hands down.

Mixed Vegetables was exactly what I needed to get me back on a romantic shojo comedy kick. It was refreshing to see our heroine both funny and capable and not head-over-heels in love with anyone…yet. Within one volume Hanayu realizes how much Hayato likes her and starts dating him. Everyone in the class is cheering them on, no mean girl’s threatening our heroine here, in very Love*Com style. And we see her going through a bit of guilt over not liking him as much as he likes her. It is rare to get to the relationship part so quickly and I am really excited about it. Fun, fast-paced, funny, sweet, and endearing. Can’t wait to pick up the next book!

I just got Fate/Tiger Colosseum Upper and it’s nothing special but it’s gosh darn fun. The game play is essentially Power Stone with Fate/Stay Night skins with some Tsukihime characters thrown in for good measure. No more and no less. Even thought I don’t speak or read any Japanese I still think that the game is very funny. They seem to have a good grasp of the Fate/Stay Night characters and play with them appropriately. Even the opening is a playful parody of other Fate game openings and scenes. The story mode makes my few words of Japanese step up to the plate as I try, somewhat successfully, to discern what is going on. This game made me realize why I like Type Moon in general. They’re willingness to totally cater and show they care about the fans in side projects. I feel if I was a creator, I would do the same for my fans. Plus any game with BER-SER-CAR and Saber in a suit is always full of awesome.