I just watched the second Kara no Kyoukai movie so I might as well talk about the first and the second movie. There are going to be seven Kara no Yoko movies each based on a chapter of the original series. Each chapter is partially a self contained story but they also all build to a unified story. The first story is a ghost story with a bit of a flashy action sequence at the end. We are dropped in the middle of the story with a decent amount of time to develop who everyone is. The second is murder mystery with the origin of how the main characters met. I don’t know why Ask John was so harsh on the second film. It was clearly meant to be an unfinished story. It presents a mystery that makes you wonder what happened that is clearly only meant to be solved in the last film. I think it is clearly a series of movies for fans of Kinoko Nasu. It’s his first major work so I feel the story telling is not as polished as his later works but I still found it entertaining. The visuals are certainly theatrical quality so it is a pleasure to watch. As far as I can tell without ever reading the original stories the adaptation is fairly faithful unlike previous Type-Moon series.
Macross Frontier 13 was exactly what I wanted to see. It actually started with 12 and continued on into this one. Ranka singing and saving the world with it, Alto fighting like hell to keep her safe, secrets revealed, explosions, awesome robot fights, and a good cliffhanger! YES YES YES! Throw in some cute moments between Ranka and Alto (which they did) and I’m basically set for life. I felt as if I have been waiting for this and now my love for the series has really burst forth. I also found it funny that in original Macross I really started to love it about the same number of episodes in.
I am also pretty sure one character who “died” in this episode can’t be dead because they were just getting interesting. They went from seemingly unimportant minor side character with intriguing questions hanging around them, to major conspirator, to dead. I don’t think so. I’m usually not one to complain about the ability to kill off characters but this character was just coming into their own.
I watched a few more episodes of GaoGaiGar. It is distinctly formulaic but it is still fun. I am curious how it supposedly it goes from a by the numbers kids giant robot show to something beyond that but I’m still in the formula section. This show has made me come to the realization that giant robot shows are nothing more than magical girl shows for boys. They have many of the same tropes just in different guises. They both have similarly organized bad guy organizations; they usually have the same recycled transformation sequences; they both have recycled finishing moves; also the finishing moves is usually upgraded at the exact same rate in both types of shows.
I was really worried about not getting my Nosatsu Junkie volume 6. However, TokyoPop did not fail me. I was really pleased with this volume, there is a huge turning point and then a cliffhanger so we don’t know the results of said turning point till the next volume. We are also seeing Naka moving into the spotlight with her modeling career. This effects Umi is some interesting ways including making him jealous and making him worry about losing his top spot, but inevitably he loves Naka more. Their relationship continues to amuse me and I love watching their hilarious and sweet encounters. Can’t wait for the next volume!
I just read One Piece chapter 506 and wow did we get some major revelations. We finally learn a good deal about the capture and execution of Gold Roger. There was something that was never quite right about the whole deal and it is finally explained. One Piece has been making a good effort to get to explaining some of the mysteries of the series as of late. I know that Daryl Surat had complained that he stopped reading One Piece because he could not get over that they kept bringing up plot threads but never resolving them. I never really was too distressed at any unresolved plot threads. I never got the feeling that they would not be resolved but I can’t say I’m unhappy that they are starting to be tied up.
Read the latest chapter of NANA. I love Ai Yazawa with all my heart but I am a bit put off by the things going on in this story recently. It seems like the longer it goes on the less she knows where she is going with it. What with the forward flashes not seeming to connect with the current arc. And funnily enough that character I have been loving and care the most about currently is Reira. She is driving things to happen and she also seems to care about the people around her. I find myself wishing for a conclusion and soon. Oh and as usual I hate Yuri, FREE NOBU!
For some reason I see Narutaki flying to Japan and starting a sit in protest outside Ai Yazawa in the way one would start a free Tibet protest. That’s it for this week’s investigations! Look for a new case file every Friday!
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Reverse Thieves 
I can’t be bothered watching the second episode of Garden of Sinners, despite how much I loved the first one
Blissmo,
I have to ask: Why? If you liked the first movie why would you not watch the second? I admit that there are 7 movies all together but it’s essentially like watching an 7 part OAV series that happened to play in theaters than 7 3-hour movies.
– Hisui
Cool that you stuck with Macross Frontier. The TV series definitely has its ups and downs throughout such that which parts are the “ups” and “downs” depends on what kind of anime fan you are, but the last third of the series went more decisively towards the type of Macross show I wanted to see. I recommend the movies once you’re done with the show (but only once you’re done with the show).
On the subject of One Piece, I actually found myself reading through the Thriller Bark arc despite the fact that I stopped reading around Alabasta. This came about because I was talking about how Brook is the greatest of character concepts and a friend of mine (who has watched all of One Piece to date) mentioned he couldn’t quite remember what was significant about Brook’s head. “Does he keep some sort of memento in his skull?” he wondered. I didn’t remember, so to the books I went.
That effectively means I read this thing having skipped all of Skypiea, Water 7, and Enies Lobby (for the time being). So we’re talking over 200 chapters of a serialized story skipped. Yet it’s not like I was lost in the slightest, because with the exception of Franky, all of the characters, settings, and the like introduced in those previous installments will almost assuredly never really be revisited upon ever again in detail.
Part of why I like the One Piece movies a lot is their end credits sequences. They’re by and large not canonical, but those are basically the only times when there’s SOME sort of acknowledgement that yes, all of these other characters that are presumably of vital significance to the main cast (if not the narrative) have NOT been forgotten about. That doesn’t happen nearly enough in the manga. In fact, I was pretty surprised when it happened once during Thriller Bark as…well, as the answer to what’s significant about Brook’s head!
Oh, I see your game. This got posted in 2008 and the RSS just went berserk making this seem like a new post. (Meaning I’ve been singing the same tune for years now.)