Hello, Spring 2015 part 2

Part 1 here~ Time for round 2!

Surely gonna miss seeing ‘Sunrise’ there

Arslan Senki (TV)

Moe X Chivalry

I’m worried it might get really ugly (like DenKyo already is) as time goes by, but so far the story has me sold. But I’m bothered about the moe-fication of Prince Arslan. Hmmmm. Anyhoo, it’s fine if anitwitter’s got someone other than Totsuka to protect.

Baby Steps 2

Oh yeaaaaaaaaah. I’m really rooting for Ei-chan and Natchan! ❤

Gintama (2015)

Okay, I decided to let some episodes pile up so I can watch them in bulks, but I couldn’t wait to watch episode 1… only to get slightly disappointed. Apologies to my past self (and Kai, by extension) for not seeing this internal predicament.

I hate to admit that for an anime I’ve just written a collab post about and really looked forward to seeing, I didn’t get to laugh a lot from this episode. Uhuh, well of course, the comedy isn’t the only point in this show. (Don’t get me wrong, I love Gintama.) The introduction was pretty great and was still humorous because it’s a parody of a real life historical event in Japan. But the plot of the rest of this episode, which I suspect will run a little longer in episode 2, isn’t exactly a good hook. I got the impression that it was trying to reuse its time travel tactics that we’ve already seen used pretty well in the second movie, which wasn’t not too long ago, too. So the effect to me is that this was kind of less impressive than normal. And by normal, I mean lots of new stuff! (You can say I was expecting something original here.) The funny thing I realized is that that was an excuse to minimize the animation here. (In this case, Gintama is still a brilliant work.)

For now, I’m blaming it on the production changes but the new director in charge of this sequel still has lots of tools to play around and make this reach the usual level of awesomeness that is Fujita’s Gintama.

Hibike! Euphonium / Sound! Euphonium

lewd #anime_eupho pic.twitter.com/ny0hsqY1HM

— catchmytears (@miharusshi) April 8, 2015

So lewd, but…

Great attention was given to the subtle details of the characterization, but this episode, if not yet the entire series, just doesn’t seem as typical as KyoAni moe show.

Anyway, I thought this episode was really good. The pacing is incredibly comfortable to sit through, and the relationships between the main characters are now established, albeit leaving room for some exciting speculations and mysteries. It seems like this series has benefited from the production of Tamako love story, as it feels very strikingly similar to the latter. Must be Yamada’s doing, but this time it’s clear that this series has already positioned itself as something different from the previous KyoAni works. Of course, it’s not trying to become a K-ON!! clone. Looking forward to the rest of the show.

I guess yuri subtext is fine, too.

Kekkai Sensen

Yes, it was a bit confusing. But the anime seems to not care about that. I think jumping right into the action is a better intro. That last part in the episode was cool. Woot. Yutapon ❤ I think I’m not sold yet, though.

Mikagura Gakuen Kumikyoku

Matsuoka Yoshitsugu can’t hide from my ears. -_-

I did not plan to watch this, but Josef recommended it for I “might like it.” I’m gaining reputation as a yuri supporter, you see, and the main character is totally yuri in my eyes.

I wish her luck in her pursuit of yuri happiness!

Anyway, this first episode was pretty energetic, thanks to the main character (and wow, she’s voiced by SHIROBAKO’s Aoi-chan). I haven’t watched or listened to the source material/niconico videos, but I think this will not become yuri. At least, there’s some surface yuri to look at.

Nisekoi

Pretty nice comeback episode. #TeamChitoge all the way! In the end, I wasn’t able to dedicate a single post for all the Chitoge faces in this episode (I’m sorry frog-kun), but please don’t mind my photo spam below:

Ore Monogatari!!

First episode and it’s already looking good! Thanks based Chihayafuru staff. :3

I might actually get to love this, despite finding the manga a bit lacking (but the narrative’s already great anyway; maybe it’s the manga art that feels lacking). That voice acting, though. O_O Eguchi and Han are both amazing!

Time for some quality Gouda Takeo faces (oh my, Chitoge has a rival!):

Punchline

It has that Kill la Kill vibe, not just from the quirky animation style but also the fanservice-with-a-purpose excuse written all over it. This was kinda messy and confusing, but I expect to get used to it by the second episode. I kinda liked that straightforward “logic” behind the time traveling scheme, though. Other than that, I’ve nothing much to say.

Knights of Sidonia: War of the Ninth Planet

This was the creepiest first episode of the season I’ve seen so far, and it just got me hooked really well! This is how creepiness should be used in an anime to spice things up! Confession: I got totally hooked that I’ve seen all the episodes released so far. And I’m loving Shiraui Tsumugi!

Cutest tentacle chimera everrrr. There’s so much bizarre gap moe happening here

The show just gets better and better, too. If all goes well with this show and my expectations, this might even end up as my favorite for this season. It’s just the most exciting that happens at the moment.

Yamada-kun and the 7 Witches

Mhmmmm

No complaints with this episode, but judging from the OP and from things I heard from twitter, (almost?) all the major characters that took so long to be introduced in the manga will have their rightful (or should I say “rushed”?) appearance in this 12-episode anime adaptation. That’s what I’m really worried about. If they go with the manga’s script, rushing everything might do no good. But on the other hand, this anime always has that option to be a bit different and it might even work well even for those who’d already seen some of the manga.

Anyhoo, I didn’t expect it to look this good. I’m loving the colors and it’s oozing with that fun vibe, albeit the cast is already funny. Having these bright colors do a lot of justice to the lovely characters and exciting mystery-unfolding plot, so there’s really nothing to lose here.

Props to the seiyuu for a fun opening act! Man, I really love the way they’re exaggerating their lines which goes well with the over-the-top, characterized gestures, making the unexpected reactions a lot funnier. So yeah, we’ve a really strong start!

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And done! I haven’t dropped any anime from this batch of titles, though I can’t guarantee that I won’t axe one along the way.