Tag: Hayate the Combat Butler

Ongoing Investigations: Case #207

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So we enter the final batch of episodes of Scooby Doo! Mystery Incorporated S2 with 16-17. While I will miss the show I’m glad they were give the chance to end the series in a tidy manner. Plus I feel overall two seasons feels like a good length for the series. While I would have liked more I don’t feel like I was robbed of anything. But we shall see how much those feelings remain when the series is actually over. Until then we have Aliens Among Us and The Horrible Herd.

After a show goes on break it is always nice to transition back into the series as if you had just watched the previous episode last week. Mystery Incorporated transitions from its big “should have been accompanied by an ominous pipe organ” revelation from Theater of Doom with a general mystery that they solve pretty quickly so they can add in some detective work on the overarching mystery.

Aliens Among Us proved that the funny was still in the series as well. Sheriff Bronson Stone seemed to be taking lessons from Giorgio Tsoukalos this episode. Also Scooby seems to imply that he is so frequently asked to dig up graves as part of their investigations that he has become slightly tired of it. Also the fact that the villains of the episode apparently lives in Frodo’s house for no well explained reason is a quick blink and you miss it gag.

Random Trivia: It seems that the GPS coordinates for Gatorsburg would put in a Warner Bros warehouse in Burbank, California which is amusing little inside joke.

The Horrible Herd on the other hand proves that Professor Pericles is playing for keeps (although killer German Stormtrooper robots is not exactly kid gloves.) There were an interesting amount of subtle Aliens homages in this episode. I am curious how much they are going to deal with the fact that a good deal of town was destroyed in this episode or will they mostly just hand wave it away. With this series either scenario is possible.

I glad to see the series is still going strong entering the endgame. I think this is really destined to be a series people look back on and wonder why it did not have a bigger fan following when it was on the air. Its lovely mixture of parody and homage make it far smarter than you would assume at first glance.

Scooby Doo! Mystery Incorporated how I’ve longed for you!!! Even after a long break, the series hasn’t lost anything. Fred still has the most amazing moments, Daphne is still awesome, and all the mysteries and oddities just keep getting piled on.

Easily the best part in either of these episodes is when Fred and Sheriff Stone have a sleepover because the gang is trying to protect the Sheriff from aliens he believes abducted him. Fred’s insights about love and how the only thing better is traps is full of sage wisdom.

Daphne’s cheese expertise, which I had totally forgotten about, comes back into play when the mass of skeleton-bee-piranha-cows descend on the town.

Throwing in the Space Kook was an excellent nod.

The Ongoing Investigations are little peeks into what we are watching and reading outside of our main posts on the blog. We each pick three things that we were interested in a week and talk a bit about them. There is often not much rhyme or reason to what we pick. They are just the most interesting things we saw since the last Ongoing Investigation.

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Ongoing Investigations: Case #198

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narutaki I had the pleasure of reading the wonderful U.S. release of Heart of Thomas. It is an over-sized hardcover, it is quite a heafty book.

But I have to say the cover is less than appealing, I think it is the muddy colors. The story though, the story is magnificent and great and you will forget all about that cover. Interior art is crisp and there are a few limited color pages within as well. Hagio Moto’s artwork is stellar with moments were it is incredibly 70s (like the eye glints) but with an overall timeless quality to it. Good page layout rounds out this classic release.

Set at a boys boarding school in Germany, the story starts in grim fashion with the suicide of a young man named Thomas. The next day a letter is delivered to the boy he was in love with, Juli, and just a few more days later a new student who bears a striking resemblance to Thomas appears. All of these things bear down on Juli who is harboring a secret and just can’t seem to move past it or Thomas’s death.

The complexities of the relationships in the series making it outstanding . Juli’s relationship with his past, Oskar’s relationship with his father, Erik’s with his mother. And then all the friendships and love that surround it all, everyone is dealing with a lot of emotions.

All the boys at the school have their demons to grapple with. And despite the ominous tone of the first half or so of the manga, characters are able to grow and move through these things leading a positive if not a happily ever after ending. I really thought it was going to all end in tragedy and I don’t think I would have enjoyed that.

I feel really grateful that I was finally able to experience this seminal manga.

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I can’t say I am ever exactly sure what to expect from Magi: The Labyrinth of Magic. I am still fairly in the middle of the road on the show even after watch episodes 8 through 11 but I do have to say it keeps itself from being complete formula shonen action. But for all the surprising little differences it has this last batch had one thing I could not have ever expected to be touched upon in a shonen fighting anime. Magi decided to touch upon the economics of large-scale debt,  monetary politics, and shady investment baking. It’s not exactly Spice and Wolf levels but it sort of threw me off guard that it was a plot element at all.

My roommate and I agree that the greatest obstacle any of the characters in this series need to overcome is not trapped dungeons, vile monsters, or enemy sorcerers. It is the fact that they tend to make some very odd principled decisions and then stick with them no matter what evidence is thrown at them until the last conceivable second. Morgiana spends forever getting over her slave mentality and it is a refreshing end to the aggravation when she finally through off those mental shackles. I wanted to like her right off the bat with her cool fighting style and shapely curves but they make it really hard.

So you figure it is the standard shonen prejudice against women. But Alibaba is just as bad with his fanatical devotion to his old friend Kassim who is repeatedly shown not to be acting in his best interest. I know they were childhood friends and that Alibaba has distinct guilt issues but man oh man. He seems determined to believe this guy has a white knight until the bitterest of bitter ends. Normally I don’t mind such things but it seems more out of an almost silly naivete more than some insight into his former friend’s true character.

I think I might have dropped Magi but my roommate will throw it on in the living room which then makes it simpler to watch than to ignore. Still the series keep wandering into this realm where I want to like it more. It has a unique setting, some interesting plot elements, and Morgiana being a wonderful mixture of sexy and competent. It just never reaches that vital stage where I love it. It just keeps dropping out one step before it can deliver the goods.

The Ongoing Investigations are little peeks into what we are watching and reading outside of our main posts on the blog. We each pick three things that we were interested in a week and talk a bit about them. There is often not much rhyme or reason to what we pick. They are just the most interesting things we saw since the last Ongoing Investigation.

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Ongoing Investigations: Case #195

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I figured I might as well get this over with while Narutaki was on vacation so she did not have to revisit this unnecessarily unless she wanted to. Let us discuss the ending of Eureka Seven: AO (episodes 21-24). I suppose we could talk about the series as a whole at another date but I just want to get this little amount off my chest. You might wonder why I put up a picture of Dewey Novak for this review considering he does not ever appear in this sequel. Trust me. He is critical.

My main complaint about the ending is simple. But it is a fatal flaw that trumps all the other many minor flaws. According to Eureka Seven: AO it seems that Dewey Novak was right. He might have been a pedophilic mass murder who would not only commit patricide but also tried to destroy the world but as it turns out he was right. Mankind cannot live with the Scub Coral and the Coralians. One race must die so one race may live. So AO flushes the entire lesson of people learning to coexist utterly down the drain. Since I though that the original show and its themes were amazing this was a less than preferable twist in the sequel. I’m not saying that is no merit to the idea of a former villain actually be proven to have a legitimate (and actually correct) reason for his insane plan. I’m just saying in this case it was done super poorly.

Then there is the fact that Elena Peoples’ story line was amazingly anticlimactic, Naru Arata’s plot line seems totally forgotten by the end, and Truth was just all over the place as a villain. Everyone switched sides at one point or another and not always for good reasons. And in the end it all did not really matter as the Quartz Gun erases about 99% of everything that happened in the series. In the end I was mostly just glad the series was over.

It is really a shame. I had decently high expectations for this series. The first episode was promising and intriguing. But sadly my initial ideas of where the series was going were far better than anything that played out on-screen. This series certainly does not ruin the original series for me. That is still aces in my book. But I would never recommend anyone watch this after the original.

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The finale has arrived, Kekkaishi’s last volume (35) hit stores as 2012 was coming to an end as well.

The finale volume is mostly falling action, which was rather refreshing, as the final pieces of the puzzle are revealed. I don’t think it is spoilers to say things mostly work out with the fate of the Shadow Organization falling to a new head. Karasumori’s existence is put to rest though still with some surprises in the mix and one very beautiful moment that brought a tear to my eye. And the rivalry between the clans Sumimura and Yukimura is dissolved.

I was pleased with the roles Yoshimori and Tokine played in the ending of this grand story. But they weren’t the only ones to have a big piece in the finale, and that’s what I liked best about the entire series. This was an ensemble cast and story which played out as such up until the very end; characters were not thrown by the wayside to build up Yoshimori’s importance. With such a great cast, I wouldn’t mind side stories about any number of them.

I’ve been so pleased to follow this wonderful shonen fighting manga for quite a while, anticipating each new installment. I’ll continue to sing its praises and recommend it even if it won’t be constantly reminding me of its presence every couple of months. I really hope VIZ picks up Yellow Tanabe’s new work in the near future.

The Ongoing Investigations are little peeks into what we are watching and reading outside of our main posts on the blog. We each pick three things that we were interested in a week and talk a bit about them. There is often not much rhyme or reason to what we pick. They are just the most interesting things we saw since the last Ongoing Investigation.

Continue reading →