Fractale is set in the distant future, in what appears to be Ireland. In this future, there is something called the “Fractale System”, which is the backbone for just about everything in your average human’s life. Fractale supports “doppels”, which are 3D holographic beings that users can control. So people can go anywhere at any time, free from a physical body.

Clain Necran lives alone. His parents, and even his dog, are doppels. He doesn’t use a doppel, preferring to live more old-fashioned. He likes collecting technology from the pre-Fractale era. He reminds me of a friend of mine, being excited over old tech.

One day, Clain runs into Phyrne, a mysterious girl who is running from some people trying to capture her. Injured in a fall, Clain takes her home because she refuses hospital treatment. She disappears shortly thereafter, leaving behind a pendant. Clain examines the pendant, finding, much to his surprise, that it contains data for a doppel.

They go looking for Phyrne, uncovering some facts about Fractale along the way…

As far as the story goes, it’s not the greatest I’ve ever seen. But it’s not horrible, either. Kinda average. However, I did find the major bad guy extremely cookie-cutter and boring. He’s a bad guy, you know he’s the bad guy, and nothing sets him apart from all the other garden-variety bad guys. So I make fun of him.

On a side note, the airship used by Phyrne’s would-be captors is a very interesting design.

Fractale Trailer

The show’s still hot off the airwaves, so I couldn’t find any really cool videos for it. Or maybe I just didn’t look hard enough. Either way, here’s a trailer.

The year is 2035. A declining birth rate has forced the closure of many schools, simply because there are not enough students. Seioh High School remains open, but morale is low.

Manami “Manabi” Amamiya is an energetic, cheerful girl who tries to do her best at everything. On the day she transferred to Seioh, a meeting was held by the Student Council to ask for volunteers to be the next Student Council President. After no response from the apathetic audience, Manabi barges in the door and volunteers. She promises to love the school and do her best.

Mika “Mikan” Inamori is the lone member of the Student Council. At least, until a certain someone came through the door… She is a shy and rather clumsy girl, often falling down or running into something. She also always has a :3 face on. (On a side note: her hairstyle and ribbon remind me a lot of Cirno. Her personality is child-like, but not in Cirno fashion, though…)

Mutsuki “Mucchii” Uehara is an excellent athlete. The various athletic clubs invite her to help them out, and she doesn’t turn them down. So she participates in several other clubs as an honorary member. She also helps out at the Student Council, despite not being an official member.

Mei “Mee-chan” Etoh is a very shy girl. When greeted by other students, she won’t usually respond. Despite her seemingly cold nature, she wants to be friendly, she just doesn’t know how. Somehow, she ends up helping Manabi with one of the Student Council’s first projects. She is also a wizard with technology.

Momoha “Momo” Odori is a member of the journalism club, and is often seen with a camcorder in her hand. She’s a quiet girl, and doesn’t always get directly involved with the Student Council, but she does do a good job of video taping.

On another note, the music in this series was superb, and I approve of it.

Manabi Straight, ep7 snippet

Working long hours in the heat of summer is not very good for you. Believe me, I know.

Oh, one final thing I feel the urge to point out: In one episode, a calendar can be seen in the background. It says June 2035, but it shows the month starting on Monday instead of Friday like it actually will. Only crazy people like me would have noticed that.

(One really last thing: As of this writing, I don’t have any more animes I feel like watching. So unless I find one that seems interesting enough by next week, this will be the end of reviews for now. :( (I am watching a series that is currently airing in Japan, but I won’t review it until it’s over. And no, I’m not gonna tell you which one it is. Feel free to guess, though.))

Disappearance was announced at the conclusion of the second season of Haruhi. That was October 2009. It is now January 2011. Fifteen months of (im)patient waiting made my excitement all the more giddy. And so I was worried that the film would be a huge disappointment after all the waiting inflated my expectations to unreasonable levels.

Such fears were totally unfounded.

The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya is now one of my top 10 favorite animes. Pity I didn’t watch it last week…

December 16th. Christmas is one week away, and Haruhi decides to throw a Christmas party. She’s going to bring home-cooked food.

December 18th. Haruhi has apparently vanished from the face of the Earth. Kyon is the only person who retains any knowledge of her existence.

Kyon actually impressed me a lot in Disappearance. After the series, where he was a mostly reactionary character, here he’s actually the main guy who drives the plot forward. And what a plot it is. I’m not sure how much I can talk about that without spoiling something important. I will say there are a couple interesting twists you need to watch out for, though. And the final climax? PURE. EPIC.

Some people have complained that the movie was too long. At 2 hours and 40 minutes, it is the length of half a whole season of Haruhi. But I feel that that time was put to good use.

You might want to re-watch the series before watching Disappearance, though. I, who watched the series twice (including Endless Eight, making Endless Sixteen,) was able to follow the story along nicely. But someone who has forgotten a lot of the series, or has not seen the series at all, will have a hard time following what’s going on. (Endless Eight is optional.)

The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya Trailer

You know what? I think I’m going to make it a point to watch this movie every year around Christmastime. Maybe right after It’s A Wonderful Life… Yep, it’s perfect.

The Bounty Hunters Who Don’t Do Anything

(Dailymotion, since the video is not on YouTube and it’s too awesome to pass up)

Cowboy Bebop is just a solid science fiction show. And just plain cool in almost every respect.

Toradora – Funny train station scene

Toradora! is a good example in the slice-of-life genre. Normal people doing normal things. With good amounts of fun and drama to keep things interesting.

Cromartie Can Can

Cromartie High School has the lulz. Nut just plain old lulz. Epic lulz.

Fee’s Withdrawal

Planetes put the “science” in “science fiction”. I still say it’s really cool for being so true to real science. (And the story’s good too, which helps.)

Breakdown

Last Exile is a shining example of the steampunk genre. And despite my misgivings about the ending, it very richly deserves a place on this page.

Storm of Valkyria

Valkyria Chronicles is somewhat similar, in some respects, to Last Exile. Despite it not really being steampunk. Dieselpunk, perhaps? Kinda sorta? To a much less extent than Last Exile, though.

Kimi no Shiranai Monogatari

Bakemonogatari is something different. The style/direction is a lot different from other things I’ve seen. And… I really like it. It’s also one of the few animes that I feel didn’t betray me at the ending…

L Discusses Cake

Death Note is an all-around great anime. A suspenseful, intelligent tale about the meaning of morality and justice. You’ll hate the main character’s guts, but that’s all part of the plan.

I’M MC AKIO!

Clannad is a masterpiece. Pure and simple. Everything about this anime is absolute perfection. The story is amazing, having just the right proportions of comedy to drama. The characters are realistic people that you can’t help falling in love with. The art, music, and everything else is stellar, and it all comes together in a way that makes you just sit back and go: “Wow…”

And “MC Akio” up there is the coolest dad to ever appear in anime all of fiction.

Memory of Mother

A Little Snow Fairy Sugar is still my favorite anime. I just haven’t come across another series with the same charm as Sugar. (Clannad came close, though. Very, very close.) Waffo!

And… That’s about it. I just want to say that I had a much harder time picking these than I thought I would. I had just finished putting eight in, and I suddenly realized that I had five animes left competing for the last two places. And I’m still not sure I’m 100% satisfied. Even after sitting there for a long time, thinking: “Ah, um, er…”

The things I go through to bring you people stuff to read every week…

Sugar: A Little Snow Fairy

Eheheheh…

The rest after the break.

Last Exile

Didgeridoos and bagpipes! Two great tastes that go great together!

Air

The show still isn’t one of my favorites, but this OP definitely is.

Azumanga Daioh

Catchiness, silliness, funniness… Generally an all-around good thing.

Paprika

I really really like the transitions here.

Toradora! (OP1)

The techno beats appeal to me.

Summer Wars

The music always puts a big grin on my face. It’s great.

Strawberry Marshmallow

This was stuck in my head for a very long time. I didn’t mind too much, though…

The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya (OP2)

I played this on repeat. For weeks. It was awesome.

Cowboy Bebop

Jazz isn’t usually a style that I really like. But Yoko Kanno is a genius, and can make everything sound good. This is epic.

So that’s that. Come back tomorrow for the anime list.

Ghost in the Shell – I don’t really know what to say about this… It’s… Enchanting.

Full Metal Panic! (Fumoffu? and TSR) – Not too bad. Of the three, I like the first one the best.

The Girl Who Leapt Through Time – Very nice. Very VERY nice.

Serial Experiments Lain – That one line at the beginning is what makes this not awesome, but AWESOME.

Macross Frontier (OP1, OP2, OP3) – I couldn’t find a video of the actual OP1. So you get just the song.

Angel Beats! (Normal and Special) – The normal one is a very nice piano piece, and Yui’s special guitar version is very good too.

Bakemonogatari (OP1, OP2, OP3, OP4, OP5) – Many OPs, for the different girls. My favorite is Tsubasa’s. By far.

Valkyria Chronicles (OP1 and OP2) – I can’t decide which is better, really…

Black★Rock Shooter – Pure. Liquid. Awesome.

Cromartie High School – XD

Record of Lodoss War – Not too shabby. That 90′s style has a certain charm to it.

Interstella 5555 – It’s Daft Punk. I shouldn’t have to say anything else.

Summer Wars – Epic. Epic. And… EPIC.

Paranoia Agent – Creepy.

Touhou Project Side Story – It’s alright…

Paprika – The song, combined with the animation, lets you know that you’re in for a treat when you watch this film. This is one of my favorite openings.

Evangelion (1.0, 2.0) – Beautiful, to put it simply. I really like the guitar in the second one. I can’t decide which version I like better, though… I go back and forth.

K-ON!! (OP1, OP2) – Just a bit too fast. I liked the first season’s OP more.

This is where our paths must part. Perhaps we’ll meet again someday. You know where to find me…

K-ON!! is, quite obviously, the sequel to K-ON!. I knew by the end of the first season that there would be a sequel. It just didn’t feel complete yet. Naturally, I was right.

The first season was about the girls’ first two years of high school, and the second is about their third and final year. So, what happened in their third year? Well… More of the same, really. Cute girls doing cute things and playing music. (Although, the ratio of music to other stuff is less in the second season. Which disappointed me.)

My favorite episode was the concert episode, where they actually, you know, played music. Though, the summer trip one was really good, too…

So basically, if you liked the first one, go ahead and watch the second one. Because you’ll probably like it too. If you didn’t like the first one… I can’t really help you there.

And… They’re making a K-ON! movie I guess? It had better be about them going to the Budokan. I’ve been waiting for that since the beginning of the first season. If they don’t use this to actually conclude the original storyline with a flair, and instead we get an hour and a half of tea and cakes, then I’ll be very unhappy.

Gohan wa Okazu

This is my favorite of the new songs. It’s about food.

Evangelion: 1.0 You Are (Not) Alone is the first in a series of four films that retell the story told in NGE. This first film is pretty much an exact copy of the story from the first six episodes, but with a major graphical upgrade. And it is mighty pretty, at that. The scene with Ramiel is now an awesomely epic sight to behold.

Evangelion: 2.0 You Can (Not) Advance, the second film in the tetralogy, is where the new story diverges from the old.

It vaguely follows the story from episodes 8 to 19, but only vaguely. I recognized some of the scenes from the old series, but quite a few events have been changed. We have a new character, different Angels, and that ending… Asuka is still here, though. That’s good. Her last name was changed though, and for the life of me, I can’t figure out why.

It would be an untruth for me to say that I didn’t like these two movies. I really hope that the ending to this new series won’t be a letdown. We’ll have to wait and see.

NGE/Rebuild comparison : 3rd Angel

In this clip from 1.0, you can see how close the old and new are.

A few weeks later, I watched Paranoia Agent. And that was cool. Then, I looked at what else the director had done. Paprika came up, and after reading the premise, I said: “Well, that sounds familiar. I should watch this.” So I did.

Like Inception, the premise is that technology exists that allows people to share dreams. In Paprika, the technology is used in psychiatry to help better understand and treat patients.

One day, one of the prototype “DC Mini” devices ends up missing. And to their horror, the development team sees that it is being used to manipulate others’ subconscious–while they are awake. And without the device attached.

I really liked this movie. In fact, I may go on to say that this was a great movie. The dream sequences were really well done. Just like in real dreams, rather than rigid sets, they flow from location to location based on emotion, with logic thrown to the wind. And yet, it makes perfect sense. The story never lost me, and I did like the changing dreamscapes here better than the more rigid ones in Inception.

And I swear, Dr. Tokita, the genius who invented the DC Mini, looks just like Gabe Newell. Seriously.

Paprika’s Inception

Both are very good films, and have my recommendation. (But Paprika was better.)

And one final note: a week before my review of Paranoia Agent went up, the news broke that Satoshi Kon, the director, had died of cancer. I was shocked, (and slightly creeped out,) as this was just a few days after I watched it. And now, after watching Paprika, I can really understand why people referred to him as one of the most inventive directors of our time.

Rest in peace, Kon-sama.

Unlike A Summer Day’s Dream, which was exceptionally good for a doujin product, TPSS should have had the subtitle “How Not To Make An Anime”.

Bad character designs, worse animation, laughable special effects, a story that seems to be little more than terrible fanfiction. Ouch.

The “story” is about Lunarian culture, and hence focuses on the crew from Imperishable Night, with some original characters. (This was made before Silent Sinner in Blue, which contradicts just about everything here.) And… My goodness, is that a MAN?! Sacrilege!!

As for effects, the whole movie looks rather blurry. It’s almost like they turned the bloom up way too high. And I’m like: “No! Stop it! Games already use that effect way too much!”

The voice acting wasn’t as bad as the rest, though. (Except for Reimu and Marisa, who sound horrible. Fortunately, they’re only on for five minutes.)

All in all, I give Touhou Project Side Story a ⑨ out of 100. It is Cirno Day, after all.

Touhou Project Side Story Part 1/5

Reisen! Reisen! Tasukete Reisen! *is shot*