Well it is days late, but I think it’s time to get this monthly decision on the road. I honestly think the battles are some of the greatest parts of watching anime. Obviously each genre has its strong points and the things that define it. Wouldn’t say slice of life series aren’t great because there aren’t explosions, just that some of the most memorable moments are some of the fights I’ve seen over the years. So I’ll try to select the fight that stood out the most in my mind for the previous month. Now it would only include what I’ve seen, be it OVA or a regular series.

So now that I’ve gotten my thoughts on fights out of the way let’s go with my selection for the month of May.

Battle Thoughts:
Now the fight that stood out the most for me came from the Tsubasa Shunraiki OVA. Now OVAs do have the strength of production values and wanting to put as much quality into the minutes that are available. Now this will assume you’ve watched the show and the OVAs that have come out. If that isn’t the case you should probably back off here.

The Syaoran vs. Clone Syaoran fight was pretty impressive. Now this didn’t last a very long period of time, but they managed to get the action displayed nicely. It was a pretty good rematch after their initial meeting in the previous OVA. Syaoran got to show off a couple nice elemental abilities with wind and lightning being used. Now he simply couldn’t overcome the firely power that was reinforced by the eye the clone stole. The blades were flashing when the magic wasn’t being used. Really they managed to keep the fight in close and yet pull back a little to show a more complete picture. The music worked well with the combat especially when it was at its peak.

Really this fight just looked great from my perspective. The characters weren’t breaking it up every few moments to chat. Once the fight started they didn’t stop until one hit the ground. Now this time it was the original, but I give him slack considering the damage took from the previous episode of the OVA. It was just a nice thing to watch before getting more into the heavy plot developments that came next.

So that’s where my choice rested for this week. There is another month in June to see what we might get. So until next month.

Well it does seem fitting that one of my first editorial posts comes in regard to Anime North. Was the first time I made it out to the event in a few years. So it was definitely a pretty fun time to go and see how things were out there. It always amazes you how busy things are and how dedicated some people can be in regards to their cosplay. I think lines and cosplay are great ways to describe the visual portion of it. It did take some time to get inside so standing in line for an hour was the starting point. I only ended up going out on Saturday due to travel and not really wanting to pay for a hotel or anything like that.

Event Thoughts:
Getting inside was definitely worth the wait. The highlight for me was that dealers room. It’s not often I can get that close to so much anime stuff at any one time. Besides saving up a little for the event allowed to probably the most anime spending I’d done at one time. It’s fairly fun to just go out there and get what you want while getting caught up in the spirit of things. Now had to be careful not to spend any money saved for food or transit since that would be a sad finish to the trip….

So I’ll just go into a walkthrough regarding some of the things I picked up. I’m not really a person that is huge on figurines so can’t say that’s where all the cash went. Honestly tried to spread it out among figurines, dvds, wallscrolls, and various other items that related to the respected anime. One day I might just get one of those swords since it would be interesting to just have one around to look at. For now I stuck to smaller things that wouldn’t weigh me down while visiting the other events.

I think a good place to start is with the dvds. I do like trying to get some series on that format when its a series I really enjoyed. It is still more convenient to just watch from the external hardrives, but I like having the physical format sitting there on the shelves. Just too bad that I like the subs more than the dub since I think the fansubbers do a better job on presentation. A good example is the D.Gray-man dvd where the text was really plain. Still this was one of my favourite series from the last year so I had to get it when I saw a copy. It really showed some of my favourite things from anime. The action was great and there were some likable characters that I worried about.

Slayers Next was another dvd that I picked up. While I was fairly hard on Evolution-R, this was one of my favourite series overall. Next was probably my favourite of all the seasons since it had good action and mixed that well with the comedy. It helps that this show had one of the best dub I’ve heard and prefer it to the japanese cast in all honesty. Anyways this was a great package with the whole series spread over a few dvds. It’s definitely a step up from the VHS copy of the show I know is in storage somewhere.

My third dvd pickup from anime north was Nanoha A’s. This was another case of picking my favourite season from an entire series. A’s was just a great ride from start to finish. They already had the background and the main characters fleshed out when it started. It was fun to watch them just jump into the action. Know I do prefer the subs for this show, but I think part of it will always rest on bias of hearing the original actors first. Just too bad about the yellow text for the subtitles. A little more effort for nice text wouldn’t hurt them. Know I’ll probably track down the original series at some point, but this was a good pickup in my mind.

Next I wanted to mention the figures a little. Never really had many anime figures so this was a pretty interesting time. There were a ton out there so it was a tough call. Wouldn’t say I saw many of really high quality from series I was very interested in. So I just had to pick up a few and start my collection off.

I liked mixing things up and just getting ones that interested me. There wasn’t much Soul Eater from what I could find, but I managed to get one of Black Star and Tsubaki anyways. They were pretty tiny things though. I’ll definitely keep my eyes open for some higher quality ones down the road. Still the poses were nice and I was glad just to find some for those characters.

Isara from Valkyria Chronicles was one of the nicer ones that I picked up. I really liked her character from playing the game so I had to pick hers up. Probably could have gotten an Alicia as well but had to spread out the funds so it didn’t quite go that way. Maybe I’ll get some more from that series down the road. She’s a kind character which ended up making her my favourite from that game. A helpful support character that kept everyone alive on more than one occasion.

Hitsugaya from Bleach was one that stood out while I was walking around. There were a few for his character available, but I liked that one enough to get it. While that show has hit some filler troubles the overall level was still pretty good. His character was one I could always understand anyways. Someone that has to stay serious in order to gain respect from those around him. I’m usually not one for the cold, but his ice bankai was a visually nice one.

I suppose the Naruto one was more on a whim. The series really has had trouble with consistency and fillers. Still got this one due to the earlier episodes and how good they were. It’s sad when a series gets hurt by it’s fear of running out of material. I say if you don’t have enough to work with then find a place to stop and take a few years for the material to build up. It only hurts the fans to see lazy writing and painfully slow progress instead of the energetic series they had gotten into.

Overall was fairly happy with the figures. I didn’t get a lot of them in the end. Still I think it’s a good place to start and in a few years I might have a nice enough collection. It did a good job of getting me interested in getting more from series I’m a fan of.

Now the wallscrolls should get some mention. I don’t have many wall scrolls so it was a nice opportunity to get some. Walls can get pretty boring so having something to liven them up is fine in my books. I didn’t want to get too many though since carrying them would be a pain. Sadly I almost lost them since I forgot to pick them up when I was done eating lunch. Luckily no one noticed and I went back pretty quickly to get them. Still they were pretty nice so I’m really glad they didn’t get taken.

As I mentioned above D.Gray-man did end up being one of my favourite series of the past year. So I’m glad that they had a few wall scrolls available at the convention. Now that was just a nice one of the main cast I thought. Besides it has Lenalee with her long hair intact which is a great thing in itself. It really just looked nice when I was looking through the racks they had scrolls hanging from so it was worth $20 in my book.

The second one I got reflected my gaming habits. Final Fantasy VII wasn’t my favourite from the series, but it certainly was a good one. Crisis Core was a great prequel that still had emotional moments even though you knew how it would end. This one really just showed the main characters nicely and gave worthy prominance to Zack who really went through a lot in the game.

Nothing like an anime convention to push you into getting some nice secondary items. The exorcist badge from D.Gray-man just went with my strange habit of getting everything I could from that show. I just happened to stumble across one when I was walking around and thought it was worth getting. You really see that badge quite often over the course of the series. It’s actually pretty nice with the symbols all over it.

Of course not to be outdone Slayers had to make it’s appearance. I ended up getting some books about the show. One of them focused on Slayers Try which was the third season of the series. It’s actually pretty nice in writing about the characters and listing some of the spells. The larger book was more of a role playing guide for the series. It’s written in a Dungeons and Dragons format and actually has some real effort put into it. Personally I liked it more for the character backgrounds and the spell listing. They did a nice job covering spells used all through the show and talking about their effects. If I played those games much it would be a pretty handy thing. Both were only $5 so it was hardly my most expensive purchase of the day.

Finally I gave into my gaming interests a little bit. I seem to get things only for a small amount of series or games. So Final Fantasy VII once again got some focus with the Tifa figure that I got. It’s actually pretty nice with a helpful stand and some alternate gloves for her. May end up expanding more of that collection if I come across other characters in the future. I respected Tifa for fighting so well with really only her body as a weapon. She was a pretty good character so if I could only get one at the convention I thought it might as well be her.

Final Thoughts:
In the end I really enjoyed my time at Anime North. It was quite a ride and there was a lot to see. The panels were pretty fun to check out. Have to say the one on Natsume was my favourite since I could really participate in it. After blogging a show you do come to have a pretty good understanding of it. You can talk on a forum, but it’s interesting to hear others thoughts about your favourite moments and the direction the series took. Though bit sad I was one of the few guys who actually attended that panel. The people I met were pretty interesting and made it worth just talking to people. In the end I had a lot of fun and plan to attend next year as well.

As FlareKnight mentioned in a post last week, the 17th was my birthday. I am a very selfish person and so I usually always use occasions like this as an excuse to spend a lot of money on myself. This year I decided to give myself A LOT of Megami magazines. I’ve always been fairly limited in my collection of anime merchandise. It’s mainly just been limited to figures however at a couple of conventions I’ve bought a couple of art books and I’ve grown more and more to like them. I figured a subscription to Megami Magazine would be something that is along those lines to help further progress such a collection. However I can’t just buy myself a subscription, there’s not much to show for it right away so I decided to buy over 20 previous issues in addition to the subscription, including Deluxe and Creators. Big pictures of all I have after the jump.

This post is to show what my jumpstarted collection is like and to simply express this acquisition. Seeing as how this is an anime site and Megami is an anime magazine, it seems to fit rather well. I won’t be doing scans or full in depth pictures of the magazines as there are plenty of people there who cut the magazines open and get like 5million x 4million pixel resolution shots of these which I don’t have any reason to compete with. But here is just a shot of my collection and to let you know of this.

I do have to say though, even though there are plenty of people with far bigger collections then mine I think I did DAMN good for a collection being this size when I only started less than a month ago :D

Here is a big shot of all of them side by side. Clicking the picture will link to a MUCH bigger shot so you can actually see what they are.

Here are some quick individual shots of the issues:

First up all of my Creator magazines. I have to say that overall I like them. The feel of them is much more like an artbook then a magazine and a lot of time I think the pictures are of more original art then just popular series, which is a nice contrast.

Here are the Megami Deluxe issues. Although these, like Creators, don’t contain any pullouts it is nice because it is pretty much 100% pictures of the posters and image, not containing a lot of other clutter. Though sometime that other clutter the magazine brings is nice, having just the art together is nice as well.

Somewhat going along with the Deluxes, here is the Super Deluxe which is rather easy to find and very well priced for such a huge art book. It basically contains all the bet images in a fashion like Deluxe does with no pull outs of the first 100 Megami magazines.

I felt Megami Super Deluxe was the perfect thing to get considering my actual Megami collection starts off at Vol. 100 which was very hard to find, as shown down below still in shrink-wrap. The rest of the issues follow.

And although I didn’t take pictures of all the big posters included in these or the pull outs, two of the last three I believe also or alternatively had something other than a big poster which I figured warranted a quick shot.

Here is a pencil board, both sides of it. I don’t know what to actually do with a “pencil board” other than treat it as art but that’s what I would do even if I fully understood the need of it.

And here is something very nice that was included with the latest issue, 108, instead of a big poster it had a little memorial book for Clannad After Story. Seeing as how I love Clannad this was a great addition. Plus the latest Deluxe had a big Clannad After Story poster anyways so everything worked out great.

Anyways, that’s all there is for now. I’ll try and do a post when I get a new one and a quick impression on it, but nothing so detailed like scans as I mentioned. So, who else collects Megami?

I’ve always been curious about figures. I regularly check out reviews and I like to look at them. (I even bought the figure book that super rats released.) I just can’t make the leap into collecting them myself. I’m pretty much at the stage of looking but not getting involved in the hobby. (Similar to my interest in Gothic Lolita.)

The main reason for this is that figures are expensive, in my opinion.  I’m not sure why they are; maybe Xebek can enlighten me. I can’t really understand why people pay so much for something that sits on the shelf. I will admit that a lot of figures look great but not sure I can fork over $90 to $100 just for one figure. I rather put the money towards anime DVDs, manga, or computer stuff. For the cost of one figure I could buy several anime series. But I guess we all like to spend our money differently.

I guess the second reason is that they seem to get sold out or placed on back order fairly quickly. I’ve tried looking into buying a figure in the past but I can’t seem to find what I want.  Usually when that happens, I say screw it. They cost too much anyways. It’s a little frustrating  and discouraging.

Well, those are my reasons for not getting into figures. They are probably the same for others in my position. Maybe one day I will buy a figure but at the moment I don’t see it happening soon. I really like buying DVDs and manga. It’s sorta become an addiction, which I imagine is the same for figure collectors. Thats probably another reason for me because I think that once I start I won’t be able to stop.

This is a post that I wrote on my old blog last summer. It was one of my better posts and I really liked it so I thought I would republish it here.

Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou (YKK) is one of those slice-of-life series (to be more specific its a iyashikei series) that people seem to miss. It’s a rare gem. I just love YKK. Not as much as Aria but it’s my second favorite slice-of-life series. It’s a peaceful, relaxing series. Very similar to Aria but it’s different in it’s own way.

Summary

So, let me give you a basic idea of the story. YKK is about an android, named Alpha, that runs a small cafe in the country-side. Alpha is taking care of the cafe while her owner is on an indefinite trip. Alpha lives in a world after some sort of environmental disaster where the ocean levels are rising.  The great coastal cities of the past are long gone memories. All that is left is a smaller world population, which creates a less complex, peaceful life. Mankind is living in its twilight years. Mankind is quietly accepting that fact. Alpha will probably be around well after the twilight of mankind has passed.

YKK is some what like your typical slice-of-life series, in which we get a glimpse of Alpha’s life and her daily activities. Some of the time the story revolves around some mundane things, such as Alpha going out for a walk, preparing coffee, sitting around drinking that coffee, serving her few but loyal clientele, etc. Not all of it is mundane things but a lot of is. I would say that YKK does have a theme. That is the passage of time and how things change over time.

Here is a great quote from Wikipedia that describes the stories in YKK:

Though often self-contained, the stories have continuity—relationships grow and change, and seemingly insignificant details reappear later. Ashinano [the author] explains few details of Alpha’s world, leaving mysteries that engage the reader as the series unfolds in a meandering progression, by turns funny, touching, and nostalgic.

The OVAs

YKK has two OVAs. One from 1998, just called Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou, and the other from 2002 called Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou: Quiet Country Cafe. Both are excellent. The second OVA seems to have a better quality but that maybe just the 4 years in animation technology. Both portray only a small portion of the story, just a few chapters. But it’s just enough to give you a good idea of what YKK is like. What I think both OVAs give us is voice to the characters, sounds to the background, and some nice music. They basically fill in the gaps that the manga cannot give us.

The first OVA doesn’t really contain much background music but I really don’t think it needs it. It works really well with YKK’s story. I would say that the character designs are just like the manga with simply drawn faces and bodies but that’s really included in both of the OVA and manga. YKK has more detail in the backgrounds and the scenery. The seiyuu (voice actors) are good but nothing really pops out at you. But the seiyuu for Alpha seems perfect. There is a fitting OP (more of an introduction) but not really an ED to speak of. Well there is a song towards the end of each episode but it’s not really an ED, considering there is some more story afterward.

The second OVA is not much different. The format is exactly the same. The only differences I see are there is some background music which sounds really like the music in Aria. And the graphics are better but like I said before that might be from the 4 year gap between the two.

Anyways, I so wish they would make an anime series out of this. The manga does have enough material for that. But I really don’t think it would work that well. Another OVA would be nice. But that might not happen as well.

The Manga

The manga for Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou is just wonderful. It adds so much more to the series. It introduces more characters and shows a lot more of story. I just love the artwork. It has a great pen-and-ink drawing style, which I like. The artwork is more focused on the backgrounds. The character designs are simple but works well. One thing to point out is that the manga will sometimes have whole chapters with no dialogue whatsoever. The pages are filled with things that are happening to Alpha or just plain scenery. So you can’t be blazing through the pages. You have to take a second to admire the scenery. It’s a lot like looking at art. I guess that is one reason that YKK is so calming. I guess some would find it boring but I like it.

Why I Love Yokohama Kaidashi Kkou

So why do I love Yokohama Kaidashi Kkou? Well, there are a number of reasons. I just love how calming and peaceful the series is. The calming/healing effect that this series has on your soul is the major reason for my love of the series.  But that’s pretty much the feeling you get from all iyashikei anime. (I will leave my explanation of iyashikei for another post.)

The next thing would have to be the artwork and the characters. They are really easy on the eyes. And Alpha is just cute and fun to watch. She has an lonely life but she is cheerful and eager to experience life. I guess you could say that she is similar to Akira from Aria.

There is really not much more for me to say about Yokohama Kaidashi Kkou. I just love this series. Now, I’m not totally sure that everyone will like it, even people that love slice-of-life.  This type of anime is an acquired taste. So I’m doubtful that the majority of people like this. But I don’t really know. I would suggest that people give this a try. You may find that you love this type of series.

As several of my past posts have indicated, I have played and beat en the Tears to Tiara game, I did so before watching the new Tears to Tiara anime. Now, for those that don’t know there is the original PC release of the game and then a recent PS3 remake. The anime is based off of the PS3 remake. The most notable changes between the PC version and the PS3 one is simply updated character designs and probably a couple of extra scenes or dungeons. However, this post is about the character design updates. I didn’t see what the characters looked like in the PS3 version before playing the PC version. It was only after I beat it that I got a look at what the characters look like in the PS3 game and new anime and OH MY GOD! THEY ARE HUGELY DIFFERENT! And that’s what I’m going to rant about here. After the jump there is a big picture showing the comparison of the characters.

Big picture comparison after the jump.

(Clicking picture links to larger size of the picture.)

As you can see here from the picture, borrowed from Sanaku Complex, this is just immensely different in so many occasions. My first thought was of horror upon seeing this. I just spent a good 25 hours playing the PC version of the game. That involves pretty much staring at these character models of hours upon hours while I listen and read text. These character models got so ingrained in me that upon seeing these new ones, it’s just…..a total shock… I’m almost speechless, but not so speechless that I can’t rant about it.

First, before I get into some of the more meaningful stuff, I’m going to go one by one down the list of the characters pictured above and point out the changes and why to me personally they are mostly bad. Although they may look nicer to someone who hasn’t experienced the game or anime, after really knowing the characters, I’ll give my impressions.

Arawn: Arawn isn’t actually that bad. It’s mostly the same, except he looks MUCH younger. It’s not that gif of a deal, but in the PC version he comes across as much wiser and having things planned out. His age gives him a kind of way about him that shows he’s just in charge; a younger version may have less of that.

Riannon: Riannon is a pretty damn big change. I mean, just look at the picture, different hair color and style fortunately though, her new look doesn’t really seem to give off the feeling of a different personality. However since she’s such an important character, such a drastic change like that does kind of have a big impact, but as I said the look does give off the same feeling of her personality.

Arthur: This one is HUGE, and probably the one I have the most trouble with just based off of how important he is and how different he looks. I mean, just look at it. Not only does he look completely different, but he looks give off different personality impressions. He is supposed to be young and naïve, but meaning well. He seems far too powerful and experienced in OP I saw, not to mention he’s not got some weird gay fur model thing going on with his exposed stomach which isn’t good at all…

Morgan: Moragn seems like she’ snot that different, but I just can’t get over it for some reason. She seems too different. From the video I saw and the picture she seems like she’s too….smart and strong. She’s supposed to kind of have this charming quality of being naive and not knowing what’s going on, but having a strong heart of wanting to do stuff. She’s supposed to be very childish; she seems too mature, mentally.

Octavia: She doesn’t actually look that different, and honestly does look a bit better. This is one of the only characters that looks slightly better and not THAT different. Plus she’s not that important anyways, so it’s not a HUGE deal either way. Why can’t the important characters have little but better change…

Ermin: This is…a huge difference. I’m not quite sure what to make of this, as Ermin is a kind of weird character. She has some quirks and is fairly funny. I actually have a feeling that the look gives off the same kind of personality, the innocent naivety, the mischievous, yet are just drastically different.

Limwris: She doesn’t look that different. The picture seems to make it seem like she’s not as nice, but it can easily be the picture. She’s not bad, one of the cases of a very little change and if anything slightly better.

Ogam: Ogam doesn’t look too different, except for his face there isn’t much change at all. He does seem like he’s more mean and strict in the new picture, but it’s not a big deal. His old picture gives off that feeling too even though his character isn’t quite like that, so Ogam is one of the few I don’t have a huge problem with.

Epona: Epona isn’t a hugely important character, although one of my favorites personality wise, so her change isn’t that big. Her new looks seems to give off a kind of seriousness to it that her character doesn’t seem to fit. She’s supposed to seem innocent and kind but actually be quite the merchant and crafty. She seems too mean, she’s not mean…

Llyr: This is one of the biggest and most drastic changes and one that I am very concerned about. Llyr is a very shy, character. She has absolutely no confidence and continually gives off a feeling of being so drastically frail. That’s just her character. She’s extremely cute how she gets worried about something and so endearing to see her accomplish something simple that she is worried about. In the new design she seems so much more elegant and, well powerful. That’s just not her character. Hopefully it’s only in her looks and design, but the impression is still there.

Rathty: This one kind of bothers me, but I don’t want to say much because it may spoil it. Rathty’s look is just so much more feminine, and Rathy is supposed to kind of come across just differently. This one isn’t too bad, but the character design just goes in a different direction. In the PC version Rathy looks more boyish but looks defiantly more girly in the new one.

Taliesin: This one is pretty fine I think. In fact, I see nothing wrong with it. First off the look isn’t very different at all. He is one of my favorite characters and I’m glad it’s not that different, if anything slightly better.

Gaius: He looks far more evil in the new version. He looks older and just…well, evil. It just seems like he isn’t supposed to come across like that. Although he’s an enemy, there’s something about his character where he looks somewhat charming and clever about things, not ruthlessly mean. But he’s, again, a bad guy so there isn’t that much concern for it.

Now honestly I do have to say that these character designs, the new ones, don’t look bad by any means. For someone who knows nothing of the original PC version of the game and just knows the anime or PS3 version, there’s nothing wrong with them. And looking at things a bit more objectively, the designs are fine and for someone with no experience with either game they would probably pick the new ones if asked what looks better. I’m just saying that I understand that the newer designs aren’t bad, but it’s just a different matter for me personally.

The real issue simply comes with me being so used to these characters. For me, “Tears to Tiara” will be those old character models, no matter how good the anime is, it’s just the fact that I originally played and beat the game, that’s what the game is essentially to me. Whenever there is such a change between different mediums of one source the first one you experience is just so ingrained in you that any change no matter how objectively good it is, is just…wrong.

However, I want to reiterate that these new designs aren’t bad, and for someone with no experience the new ones may look better, but for me I’ll always prefer the old models just because that’s what I experienced first. Those are the characters that I saw progress though the plot, not these new ones.

Data:

Name: Saginomiya Isumi

Anime/Manga: Hayate no Gotoku (Hayate the Combat Butler)
Age: 13 – 14
Height: 144cm
Weight: 30kg
Blood Type: O
Birthday: September 24th
Other:

• Isumi is the inheritor of the secret mystical power called Jutsushiki Hachiyo, the spell of the eight leaves. This power is only inherited by a chosen female child in the Saginomiya family.
• She’s been friends with Sanzenin Nagi since childhood when she took an interest in her manga.

Pictures and thoughts after the jump.

Several Hayate episodes were released recently and as I was constantly raving and ranting about how awesome Isumi is I thought that she would be perfect to do a character profile of. She really is simply amazing. She’s easily my favorite character in Hayate no Gotoku. Truly I always say that the best parts of an episode are the scenes she’s in; she truly does need her own spin-off. She really is an amazing mix of cute and air headed. It’s a bit hard to explain her character type. I almost want to say shy, as she is a bit soft-spoken and certainly isn’t as outgoing as say Sakuya, yet its not like she continually hides or anything. It’s more like she’s just really quiet. Still, she manages to be hilarious and cute at the same time.

I of course have to talk about her biggest “charm point” would be the fact that she continuously gets lost at the easiest of traveling. Now, getting lost isn’t a completely new and unique factor to Isumi, there have been plenty of situations in anime where someone gets lost and even some minor things like a particular character always getting lost when perhaps they take a car ride somewhere far away. However I don’t know any anime character or anime that utilized it to the extent it is with Isumi. It’s absolutely hilarious when she gets lost. Although it has pretty much been the same joke throughout the series it still really manages to be funny each time mainly because they don’ spend too much time focusing on it and it’s to such an amazingly huge degree. Taking a walk in your own garden and getting lost to the point of being at the other end of the country, walking to the bathroom and winding up in the middle of the city, it’s really hilarious to me.

Aside form the getting lost part there are plenty of other adorable things that Isumi just does naturally. The way she views life kind of innocently is fun to see. One scene from a recent anime episode comes to mind where she is floating on a box and stretching her arm out with a stick waving it back and forth futilely at a shark. It was incredibly cute to see. However while she has this amazing adorable point to her she also seems to have this amazing spiritual power. She’s shown in the OP as defeating some monsters/spirits with some charms and there are several episodes where she has pulled out a charm and totally kicked ass.

And now, the rest of the pictures. Most pictures are links to their larger versions, if they have one.

^One of my favorites

^Other Favorite

Hello all, it’s your favorite lovable loli, Xeby-chan. Well, it’s been a long time since I had a poll, but here I go. As the title kind of mentions, this poll is a question on what kind of anime merchandise you, the fans of anime, buy. While anime fans all have in common the fact that they like anime, seeing as how there are multiple different kinds of merchandise and some are very expensive, I was just wondering what particular type certain people may migrate too.

I have listed several of the major merchandise items I could think of. I realize that many people do collect more then one kind of merchandise, but this is asking which of those kinds is more prominent in your collection. In other words what kind of merchandise do you like and/or collect the most. Choose your top answer, even if you have multiple just pick the one that are the biggest in your collection.

IMPORTANT! This is a poll on what you BUY, not download. Things you’ve have paid money for.

The options are:

• Anime DVDS
• Manga
• Artbooks
• Figures
• Small Items (Plushes, Keychains, etc.)
• Don’t Collect Any Merchandise

Go ahead and comment to give your reasons :D

Hello everyone, it’s your favorite super cute loli, Xeby-chan here. I’m here to talk to you about everything! Weeeeeee….I’m going to be talking about the year 2007 in terms of what it meant for anime, talk about the most popular, most hated, most varying opinion anime that aired. This will include shows that were playing in 2007, not just that started. As long as it ran into 2007 for more then the month of January, it’s included. Of course, I won’t mention every anime…just the ones I find need some mention, ht eons that were my favorites, others favorites, and so on.

This post is a substitute for an awards like post that Xebek did last year. I figured there are way too many shows with way too many varying opinions to really label one show as the best so instead I‘ll mention several of the better ones, as well as shows that weren’t necessarily good but where a bit unique or special.

I repeat, this isn’t a list of the best shows it’s a list of the shows that “made the most noise” in the anime community and why.

This is also a very long post, so just keep reading, not get intimidating by the amount.

I do want to mention that there will be several series left out that may deserve a mention mainly because I haven’t seen them. It may seem most of these are just what I blogged and that’s because….well, it is. What I blogged is pretty much what I watched and I can’t give too much insight or opinion into shows I haven’t watched. I will mention a couple really big ones that I didn’t blog, but there are a lot that I’m missing and I know that. Don’t yell at the loli! That’s what comments are for (Not the yelling!) for telling me what else there is :D

Okay, I kind of lied. I will officially award one show an “Award” but not for best show, for the show that made the most noise in the anime community. Some praised it, some trashed it, but in my view it is the most talked about anime of 2007 and has the most varying opinion and changed some things. The award for “Most Talked About And Influential Anime” goes to…

Lucky Star

Regardless of whether or not you liked the show there is no denying how much discussion arose from this. Just the fact that there was so much varying opinion from people was interesting enough. This show was either praised as a gift form god or called a pile of crap. For the most part I didn’t get the impression people were bashing it just for being popular, as is the case with several popular shows. People will say it’s overrated and say it sucks when that may not be the case. However people seemed to genuinely dislike this show if they said bad things about it. It is one of the most varying opinion shows I’ve ever seen.

Some of this may be contributed to the fact that it was made by a company that had recently released two anime that were beautifully visually done, one of which became one of the most popular shows ever and the other that focused on a very unique kind of drama. Both of these shows were praised by many people yet when the same company came out with this, an incredibly random and rather odd show that was nothing at all like the popular pieces recently released people were a bit stunned. That cold be contributed to this, I’m not sure but the facts are that there were many people who loved it and many who hated it.

Lucky Star was certainly an interesting show. The show seemed to really be about nothing. It wasn’t like some other comedy shows, they didn’t solely get the humor form quirky characters doing weird things but they seemed to take every day situations and just talk about them. The characters were interesting but not incredibly outrageous. Even Konota had some basis in reality. It was pretty much about ordinary people doing ordinary things but the way they commented on them was what made the humor. I’m not going to get into saying if its good or bad, as that’s to the point of this post, but it certainly did find favor in several people.

Now, for the others….first though, I do have to say that as I was writing this post and writing the entry for ef – a tale of memories I decided to add another official “award” This is completely my personal opinion and pick, but this is my site so that’s all I need. The award for “Anime Of The Year 2007” goes to…

Ef – a tale of memories

I have to list this because it is personally one of my favorite shows ever, which means it has to be mentioned for this individual year. Some people don’t like it and it’s kind of to the point where I like this show so much that I’m not even going to bother defending it, if you don’t like it that’s fine. Some complained it was too artistic with all the Shaft animation things but I think it was fine. The stories and the characters were amazing and for me personally it just has to be listed. Definitely one of my favorite all time anime, which of course means its one of my favorites for this year. Ah hell, I don’t care what others think, This is by far hands down my top favorite anime of 2007.

Now for the other’s…really…

Kanon & Clannad

I’m going to be group some shows together because the thing that’s noteworthy about them is related. Kanon and Clannad are definitely a pair of shows that fit as a pair better then any other two shows excluding sequels this season. While Kanon wasn’t completely confined to 2007, about half of it was which makes it count. Both of these shows were based off of visual novel games made by Key and then both of them were animated by the same company KyoAni. That alone points to them being nearly identical, and in a way that’s kind of the case. I’m not saying there are no differences but the way they both handle the characters, breaking the series into several arcs that deal with individual girls is the same throughout.

These shows almost again seem to be a love it or hate it kind of situation, although the sad thing is that seems to be the case with nearly every single anime. Some people hate anime just for being popular, saying that it’s not as good as the hype which automatically makes it horrible. Regardless, I loved both series. I think the kind of drama mixed in with every day situations and a supernatural them is very interesting to watch. They don’t have big magic fights and some of the magic isn’t as apparent, but its there. It’s as if they use the magic as a means to just progress a character, not as a focus itself which is interesting to watch. Both shows have a great amount of drama in them which I do find interesting. If you don’t’ that’s fine, I don’t want this post to turn into something that defends or attacks shows, but these two shows were made by the same company that really released some very high end and popular shows, these being among them.

Shakugan no Shana II & Zero no Tsukaima II

I have to mention these two together not only because of similarities in the actual show but just because they were both sequels. There were quite a few sequels that came out this year, these two being among the most talked about just because the original series was rather well known. Whether you like it or not they were both sequels to well known series and it was interesting to see how things changed with a second season being able to pick up right in the middle of things. It seemed as if both shows made use of this as they both seemed to kind of explode with romantic development because they didn’t need to spend a lot of time introducing things like the first seasons did.

Nanoha StrikerS

This show was certainly interesting in just the basic premise of what was going on. I’ll admit that this show didn’t really turn out the best. Even though I am a HUGE Nanoha fan, a fan of the first two seasons, I can see that this didn’t turn out the best and I don’t entirely blame people for dropping it. However despite it not turning out the best just the fact that the show would do something such as take this huge of a time gap was interesting. If you include all Nanoha series into one and refer to it as one series they spent half of the series with the characters at age 7ish (I’m not sure actual age and I think it’s listed as different in several places) and the other half of the series with them around 22. These ages may be a bit off but it seems as if there’s a good 15 year gap. StrikerS doesn’t deal with them as teenagers, Fate, Nanoha, and Hayate are full grown adults. For the show to take characters that were little girls and then make them into adults while saying it’s a sequel and not a spin-off was just interesting. The mood of the show changed a bit and the way the story was handled was different but just seeing them grown up was…odd and kind of fun to see. It was more then an epilogue it was a full length series with them as adults, and you don’t see that much…at all.

Shuffle Memories

I have to mention this around mentioning other sequels and pseudo sequels. This series was just…odd. It…it was the same thing that had been released before really. 11 of the 12 episodes were entirely made up of clips from the first series without any real new information. It was such an odd thing to do. Memories really isn’t a substitute for the actual show. Watching Memories instead of the original doesn’t do the show justice at all so to really get any kind of understanding from Memories is to watch the original and in doing so you’ve seen what memories offers. I’m just not sure what to say about this, it was like a recap of an entire series. For double the episodes you can just watch the real series and get a lot more understanding and enjoyment out of the arcs. Whether or not the original is good, it’s certainly better to watch the whole series then Memories so I’m not rally sure what this was trying to accomplish.

Sola

This was another show that I really loved in the 2007 year. It kind of came out of nowhere but I really loved it. It wasn’t really a “popular’ show and it didn’t get a lot of hype, but I still loved it. It turned from something that seemed like it was going to be a normal romance show into something that was heavily based on supernatural things. It turned form something that seemed like it would be rather happy and fun to some very serious drama. It’s a bit hard to explain but I loved it.

Kodomo no Jikan

I’m listing this not because of how good or bad it was but just because it was a bit of a controversial anime. The manga it’s based off of is rather controversial because of the huge loli fanservice it has. The anime had a lot of that, and it dealt with the same events such as Rin doing things that aren’t exactly the best for those concerned about the content. However the anime had a ridiculous censoring on it. It didn’t make sense at all half the time as they would censor some things and not others that you would think need to be. In other words they didn’t censor all the fanservice shots, just some of them. The show got to the point where I refused to watch it until the DVD releases so I could see it without censoring, not because I want to see those loli images but because the censoring just took away from the flow of things. Either way you view it the content it had and the censoring defiantly made it a rather interesting point of talk.

School Days

I feel I have to mention this show even though I’m not listing it at all because I like it. In fact it is probably my least favorite show of 2007. It started off with a lot of potential but then just went to hell. The characters became total bastards. They went from interesting to one of the most hated characters I’ve ever seen. The ending was just f’ed up. It wasn’t bad because it didn’t fit, but things just got so messed up in the series that it became a horrible show to me. Some may disagree but I absolutely hated the show at the end because I hated the characters and didn’t feel anything for their situation. I’m listing it because the show just became something I’m almost wishing I’d never seen.

The rest I’ll only say a little bit about.

Hayate no Gotoku

This show has been going on since the spring season of 2007 and is still going on. The show itself may have fallen into a bit of a rut as the episodes are becoming a bit repetitive because of how long it has gone on but it’s still a great show with a lot of really cleaver humor and plenty of parodies. Plus, tsundere lolis – that’s all a show really needs.

Minami-ke

I hadn’t heard anything about this show before it came out but it quickly became one of my favorite shows. It has tons of great humor and I’ve hardly seen anyone say a bad thing about the show. It’s a very funny show with great characters.

Manabi Straight

This aired at the beginning of 2007 but it was a very fun show to watch. It really didn’t turn into anything that became super outstanding and it’s almost been forgotten to a point because of some of the other pure comedy shows that came out but it was a very fun show to watch. Even though it didn’t have the best of comedy it was just fun to watch and the characters were great.

Idolmaster Xenoglossia

I don’t watch much mecha shows but I watched this one and I ended up loving it. It just seemed to have something about it that was different form many other mecha shows that I’m not huge fans of. This show had the right amount of interesting characters and an interesting enough rules for mecha and their “souls” that made things interesting and not stupid like other mecha shows.

Myself; Yourself

This really turned out to be an amazing show. It seemed from the beginning that it would be a typical harem romance comedy but really turned into something far more, focusing on some rather serious and dark issues and drama. It aired at the same time as my Anime of the year, but if it didn’t it would have won a lot more episode of the week awards.

D. Gray-Man

This show really was completely a 2007 show. It aired right before 2007 and is still ongoing, so it’s aired continuously throughout 2007. It’s not really amazing of a show, it’s pretty much a typical shounen show but it’s defiantly my favorite shounen show. Then again, this is one of the only ones I’ve seen. The show started getting boring with a lot of fillers but when the “second season” came about after episode 52 it picked up and has been great ever since.

Here now are some of the more noteworthy shows that I haven’t actually personally watched. Some I am very familiar with while others I don’t even know what it’s about.

Code Geass

Unfortunately I haven’t actually watched this show yet. I have it downloaded and on my “To Watch Soon” list but I don’t have any first hand opinions on the show. However I have heard enough about it to know that it is one of the more popular shows of 2007. Again like some shows this wasn’t limited entirely to 2007, as it started in 2006 but enough of it was in 2007 that I’m including it. Although I didn’t watch it myself I certainly remember all the talk about this show while it was coming out. It was talked about…a lot, and just the fact that I’m including it without having seen it shows that it is one of the more noteworthy shows of 2007.

Death Note

This certainly was an extremely popular and much talked about show. I haven’t watched the whole thing, I saw the first couple of episodes but I do know how it turns out which is partially why I didn’t follow through with it. It was very popular probably because the basic premise of the show is rather unique to it. That and the fact that the main character is kind of evil was just fun to watch.

Higurashi no Naku Koro ni Kai

The first season of Higurashi was certainly unique enough. Psycho murderous lolis is a character type you don’t see much. Well, there was Illya from FSN. Anyways, I haven’t seen either season but again I have it downloaded and on my “To Watch” list. It doesn’t seem like this second season was any less violent, in fact this and School Days were actually suspended for a while because of real life murders that may have been edged on by either show.

Moe-tan

I only watched the first couple episodes of this show, partially because the subs didn’t keep up, but it was certainly an odd show. Based off of something that taught Japanese/English it was a weird mahout shoujo show about a high school girl who looked loli and wore very fanservicy outfits, way more then other mahou shows. It was just such a unique and odd show that I had to mention it.

And here are the rest of the shows that I have heard from several people as being some of the better or more interesting shows but I have no information on them really, however I’m just listing them to make fans of them happy. If anyone wants to say in the comments why any of these shows were good go ahead.

Claymore

Seto no Hanayome

Dennou Coil

Nodame Cantible

Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei

Gurren Lagann

Well that’s about all. I know I’ve forgotten several series that may deserve to be on this list and have something mentioned about them but my take on these shows is limited because of the fact I haven’t seen them. That’s where you reader’s come in! Help a cute loli out and tell me what you think, your takes on some of the more popular, good, bad, and unique shows of 2007 – especially the shows that I’ve neglected to mention due to not watching them. I may even decide to watch them if you’re nice enough. If you do, I’ll give you a super special awesome loli cookie.

So from us at Xeby-chan’s blog, Happy New Year’s, may the loli gods watch over you. Xebek, say something.

No, and it’s not your blog damnit.

Xebek say’s Happy New Year’s as well.

No I don’t!

Bye-Bee

…

It’s me again, Xeby-chan. Sorry I haven’t been making too many posts, Xebek has been busy with these “final” things. It’s so stupid since he takes them like twice a year, they aren’t final. He never spends anytime with me anymore, it’s so unfair. Anyways, I just want to wish everyone a Merry Christmas from me and Xebek. This post may be coming a bit late compared to everyone else saying this considering a good portion of the people who read this live in a part of the world where its already over and truth be told It’s nearly over where I am, but I don’t care I’m still saying it :D

As far as any anime’esque acquisitions I got for Christmas, I didn’t get anything directly anime related. It is very hard for my family to shop for me regarding anime at all seeing as it is very specific in what I would want. My big item I did get for Christmas though is an ipod Touch. It’s kind of anime related seeing as how one of the things I’ll be using it for is watching anime on it and holding all those cute loli pictures. It’s ok though, I’m a loli too so there’s nothing wrong with it :D

A quick note about the site overall, Xebek said he will be doing some work on it, fixing up the pages and adding a couple of them to better organize the Episode of the Week thing and fix up/add other features. I’ll also try and make a lot more of my editorial posts once some of the holiday things die down, specifically some of the character profiles which may be getting its own page. Aside from that things will go as normal, I’ll be doing an end of the year post talking about some of the more significant shows this year. Xebek didn’t have time to do a whole awards thing like last year, but I will do some kind of end of the year post.