Gee, it’s summer already, and I haven’t yet finished ignoring the spring anime season. Is there anything coming up that’s worth my attention? Let’s see. Moyashimon Returns and Dog Days’, probably. I might check out Sword Art Online, Joshiraku and Jinrui wa Suitai Shimashita (Humanity Has Declined), ((Speaking of decline ….)). And that’s all that looks even slightly interesting.
Out of morbid curiosity, I watched fifteen minutes of Muv-Luv Alternative: Total Eclipse. Pros: Girls in skin-tight uniforms. Cons: Everything else.
I did watch the first episode of Chouyaku Hyakunin Isshu: Uta Koi all the way through. The art is low-budget but pretty. It looks like the emphasis of the storytelling will be on romantic intrigues, which is not of great interest to me. What did catch my eye was the botany in the opening, in particular what looked like Epiphyllum hybrids. This is curious, because the parent cactus species come from Central American jungles and were not likely to have been cultivated in 13th-century Japan.
*****
I recently finished the first season of Dog Days, by the way, and it was good. I wish I could recommend it for youngsters, but there is a little too much fanservice.
I also finished Soul Eater, finally. At the two-third’s point, it looked like it was going to be a very good series, with Vast Conspiracies Revealed at the end, and Everything Explained and the World Put to Rights. But the plots fizzled out, and the rest of the show ended up being mostly just a lot of fighting.
Which is not to say that it’s a bad show. It is always entertaining, with effortless transitions between violent action, horror and farce. It just could have been more.
*****
I see that Haibane Renmei will be available in September for a very good price.